Newsweek calls it "The Banker & The Anchor."

Johnnie L. Roberts says Todd Thomson "apparently sealed his fate" with an attempted Sundance Channel cosponsorship last year. When channel CEO Larry Aidem invited Maria Bartiromo "to participate in a series that Sundance was planning... there was a stumbling block: funding."

"'I know someone: Todd Thomson,' she is said to have told Aidem, adding that Citigroup is a large CNBC advertiser. With Bartiromo's referral, the deal was clinched: a $5 million commitment by Smith Barney, a Citigroup unit reporting to Thomson."

When Thomson's boss learned of the deal this month, "he exploded," and you know what happened next...