E*Trade Chairman Layton to add role as CEO: WSJ

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E*Trade could not be immediately reached for comment.

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - E*Trade Financial Corp. <ETFC.O> plans to give Chairman Donald Layton the additional role of chief executive officer, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

E*Trade could not be immediately reached for comment.

Layton, has been chairman of E*Trade since November, when hedge fund Citadel Investment Group injected $1.75 billion into the New York company. Citadel supports Layton's hiring but doesn't hold a seat on the E*Trade board, the newspaper reported in its electronic edition.

Former E*Trade CEO Mitch Caplan resigned in November and was succeeded on a temporary basis by Jarrett Lilien, the company's president and chief operating officer.

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Lilien has been invited to stay on as president and COO, the newspaper said.

Over the next three years, E*Trade expects to write down an additional $1.5 billion on its mortgage holdings, the report said.

E*Trade and Citadel have discussed the possibility of trying to find a buyer for the home-equity portfolio, which would could pave the way for a sale of the entire company, the newspaper said.

Ed Nicoll, the former CEO of electronic-trading firm Instinet Inc., had been interviewed for the role of E*Trade's CEO, the newspaper said.

(Reporting by Jessica Hall, editing by Jacqueline Wong)

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