Shell, RJR Plan Major Job Cuts; Citigroup Expected to Do the Same

Two giants in their industries announced restructurings on Monday that would put a big dent in earnings and could slash thousands of jobs, while another was reportedly on the verge of making a similar announcement.

Royal Dutch/Shell Group, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, said it will take $4.5 billion in special charges in the current quarter in a radical restructuring that would shed businesses and cut costs by about $2.5 billion by 2001 in a bid to improve returns to stockholders. The Anglo-Dutch group’s plans will include “substantial” job cuts.

RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp., one of the largest cigarette makers, unveiled a sweeping plan to cut about 16% of its global tobacco work force as it wrestles with the effects of the $206-billion litigation settlement with U.S. states, stiffer competition and economic turmoil in Russia.

At the same time, RJR’s struggling snack food business, Nabisco Holdings Corp., expects to cut about an additional 3% of its work force--or about 1,500 jobs--as it launches the second portion of a two-part restructuring begun in June. RJR said the actions in both the tobacco and food businesses will force the company to take a fourth-quarter charge of $348 million, or $1.07 per share.

Shell said it will sell about 40% of its chemicals businesses and will trim its oil production and refining businesses. The company didn’t say how many jobs may be cut, saying the numbers will be discussed with employees in the next few months.

And Citigroup Inc., the world’s largest financial services company, is expected to announce a massive restructuring that will probably mean thousands of job cuts and would slice $1 billion out of profit, most of it in the fourth quarter.

Citigroup, the product of a merger between Citicorp and Travelers Group Inc., has said since the October deal that it would take a restructuring charge against profits in the fourth quarter, but it has so far declined to quantify it. The company also has not denied previous outside estimates that it plans to eliminate 5% of its combined 160,000-member work force, or about 8,000 workers.