It looks like AIG CEO Bob Benmosche has decided to stick around for a while. The Wall Street Journal reports today that he's just signed a noncompete agreement, which part of his $10.5 million compensation deal is contingent on. The piece also suggests Benmosche assured AIG's board yesterday that he's committed to staying.

For those who haven't been following the story, Benmosche appeared to be on the verge of resigning two weeks ago amid frustration with restrictions on executive pay. (That would have meant a fifth CEO for AIG in the span of 18-20 months.) AIG is in the pay czar's crosshairs, of course, and Benmosche feels like he can't compete for the talent he needs to revive the company if he can't offer competitive salaries.

If you're interested in reading more on this, TNR contributor Gabe Sherman has some great backstory in his piece this week in New York magazine. Here's Gabe's account of the build-up to yesterday's board meeting:

Back in October, not long after Lehman Brothers collapsed and triggered a meltdown on Wall Street, one of the hottest e-mail forwards making the rounds among finance types was a letter by Andrew Lahde, a hedge-fund manager who had posted eye-popping 866 percent returns in 2008 by betting on increases in U.S. subprime mortgage defaults.

Being Treasury secretary is usually not a job that calls for great political skills. But with a banking crisis crippling the economy and threatening to turn a recession into a depression, Tim Geithner has been plunged into the center of politics--as both the person responsible for what the administration should do, and as the main exponent of that policy. But he has faltered in crafting an effective policy and failed miserably in putting it forward.