Citigroup and Merrill Lynch will eliminate a total of 13,000 slots this quarter. Bear Stearns campus hires will survive in some divisions, not others.

Citigroup will cut 9,000 jobs during the second quarter, on top of the 4,200 it cut last quarter. Chief Executive Vikram Pandit had previously hinted at larger cuts, saying he planned to reduce the bank's cost base by up to 20 percent. Analysts have said Citi will cut about 25,000 jobs in the next few months. Citi's IT budget - which runs into the tens of billions of dollars - is close under the microscope. Citi employs some 23,000 developers, and its decentralized operation includes a number of duplicated functions.

Meanwhile, joining a long line of institutions and funds seeking bargains in distressed debt, Citi shook up credit trading teams in New York and London. Carl Meyer was made global head of distressed trading, according to Dow Jones Newswires. The New York-based manager had headed both distressed trading and North American high-yield trading. Brian Archer was named global head of investment-grade and high-yield credit trading, and will relocate to New York. To succeed Archer as head of European flow credit trading, Citi hired Tim Gately from Goldman Sachs.

Merrill Lynch announced plans to eliminate 4,000 jobs in capital markets and trading this quarter, amounting to 10 percent of its work force excluding financial adivsors and investment associates. Merrill's head count shrank by 1,100 last quarter, ending at 63,100, mostly due to the winding down of its First Franklin mortgage lending unit, the sale of another lending unit to General Electric, and fewer broker trainees.

As expected, Bear Stearns' new owner, JPMorgan Chase, rescinded many of the 300 permanent job offers to new graduates and MBAs. The New York Times reports students hired for Bear's energy, prime brokerage and merchant banking divisions will keep their jobs, while most who were to start in equities, banking or fixed-income saw their offers evaporate. In order to keep their signing bonuses - $10,000 for undergrads and about $50,000 for MBAs - they'll be required to sign agreements not to sue the bank. As for Bear's 300 summer interns, the Times says some will work in JPMorgan divisions, while the bank will pay others to work at charities.

Citadel Investment Group is on a hiring spree, poaching top talent from Wall Street. The Chicago-based alternative investments firm recently hired Nick Taylor away from Credit Suisse to lead its principal investments activities for Asia and Europe. Citadel also hired David Noh as head of Asian merchant banking, based in Hong Kong, where he had headed Pacific Rim principal investments for Merrill Lynch and co-founded Merrill's distressed debt group. Kaveh Alamouti joined from hedge fund Moore Capital as head of global macro investments.

Duff & Phelps opened a Washington, D.C., area office by purchasing Dubinsky & Company, a Bethesda, Md., firm specializing in dispute and litigation support, fraud and forensic accounting, valuation and expert services.

Scotia Capital hired analyst Mark Polak from RBC Dominion Securities to cover energy stocks from its Calgary office. He replaces Nick Rontogiannis, who is leaving to join an unspecified British hedge fund, reports the Globe and Mail.

Alpha Magazine's tally indicates the top hedge fund tycoons earned even more in 2007 than a set of estimates published earlier this month. John Paulson - whose firm achieved spectacular returns by being among the first to bet heavily on sub-prime collapse - took in a record high $3.7 billion, according to Alpha's annual pay ranking. George Soros took second place, with $2.9 billion. Alpha's ranking differs from one published earlier in April by Trader Monthly. Both lists, however, show five individual fund company owners earned $1 billion or more last year.