CIT GROUP INCORPORATED

'CIT Group Inc.' is a leading global commercial and consumer finance company, founded in 1908. CIT has more than $74 billion in managed assets. CIT is a Fortune 500 company and is a part of the S&P 500 Index, and is a leading participant in vendor financing, factoring, equipment and transportation financing, Small Business Administration loans, and asset-based lending, and does business with more than 80% of the Fortune 1000. The company's global headquarters are in New York City, and the company has more than 7,300 employees in locations throughout North America, Europe, Latin America, and Asia Pacific.

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Structure

CIT's Commercial Finance business offers secured lending, leasing and factoring products including direct loans and leases, operating leases, leveraged and single investor leases, secured revolving lines of credit and term loans, credit protection, accounts receivable collection, import and export financing, debtor-in-possession and turnaround financing, and acquisition and expansion financing. Commercial Finance also offers investment banking advisory services.
CIT's Specialty Finance business consists of home lending, student loans, vendor financing, small business loans, small/mid ticket product leasing and global insurance services.
==History^[1]==
CIT was founded on February 11, 1908 by Henry Ittleson in St. Louis, MO. The company moved to New York City in 1915, where it remains to today. By that time, the company provided financing for wholesale suppliers and producers of consumer goods. The company added automobile financing to its product line in 1916, through an agreement with Studebaker. During World War I, CIT began to finance the manufacture of U-Boat's and also added consumer financing of radios through an agreement with Thomas Edison, Inc. During the Roaring 20s following the war, consumer spending rose dramatically and CIT prospered in its consumer appliance, furniture, and automobile financing groups. In 1924, CIT incorporated in Delaware and listed itself on the New York Stock Exchange. CIT entered the field of factoring in 1928 and expanded operations into Europe in 1929.
With World War II looming, CIT closed its German operations in 1934. Arthur O. Dietz succeeded Ittleson as president of the company in 1939. During the war, CIT offered its 2000 employees a month's bonus, life insurance, and a guaranteed job on return if they served in the armed forces. From 1947 to 1950, the company's net income rose from $7.3 million to $30.8 million. Ittleson died at age 77 on October 27, 1948.
The company moved into a new building at 650 Madison Avenue, NY in 1957. In 1960, Walter Lundell succeeded Dietz as president of the company. Five years later, in 1959, the company passed $100 billion in financing volume since its founding. The Vietnam War racial turmoil of the 1960s resulted in CIT making changes to its business. in 1969, CIT entered the personal and home equity loan and leasing business and left auto financing. In 1979, restrictive banking rules forced CIT to sell its bank,