The U.S. Treasury Department announced on Monday that will offer two groups of warrants to buy stock in Citigroup Inc. that it obtained as part of the bailout of the bank during the financial crisis.

The Treasury said that, on Tuesday, it will offer 255,033,142 A warrants and 210,084,034 B warrants through a modified Dutch auction with Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. acting as its agent.

The auctions will start at 8 a.m. (1300 GMT) on Tuesday, January 25, and end at 6:30 p.m. (2330 GMT) that day. Bidders can bid at any price over the minimum of 60 cents a warrant for the A warrants and over the minimum of 15 cents for B warrants.

The Treasury had announced on January 14 that it intended to auction warrants in Citigroup, Boston Private Financial Holdings Inc and Wintrust Financial Corp during the current quarter.

It said then that the auctions would rid it of its final investments in all three financial companies.

In December, the Treasury sold the last of its common shares in Citigroup that it acquired in the $45 billion bailout of the bank in 2008 and 2009. The Treasury said that it has earned a $12 billion profit on its investments in Citigroup so far.

The government obtained the warrants at no cost and net proceeds from the sales should add to the Treasury's profit.

(Reporting by Glenn Somerville, Editing by Andrea Ricci)

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