A Regulatory Odd Couple

The Odd Couple: The S.E.C. and High-Frequency Traders  |  Regulators are getting help policing the rapid-fire markets from an unlikely source - the rapid-fire traders. Tradeworx, 45-person high-speed trading firm based in New Jersey, has designed a program that will allow the Securities and Exchange Commission to see every bid and offer on each of the nation's 13 public stock exchanges. “The system, akin to an X-ray machine for the stock market, could enable regulators to detect whether trading firms are overwhelming the market's plumbing when they rapidly submit and cancel orders,” Nathaniel Popper and Ben Protess write in The New York Times. While critics contend the program is akin to “the fox guarding the hen house,” the trading firm defends its partnership with regulators. “Where else are they going to be able to get these capabilities?” said Manoj Nar ang, the chief executive of Tradeworx.

 

Looking Ahead to a Twitter I.P.O.  |  While many social networking companies rushed to the public markets, Twitter seems to be taking the slow, methodical path. Insiders say the company is aiming to go public in 2014, and “after the Facebook fiasco,” the chief executive, Dick Costolo, “will have to persuade Wall Street that Twitter, and its share price, could keep rising,” Nick Bilton writes in The New York Times.

The I.P.O.'s of Facebook, Zynga and other companies hang like a cloud over the tech industry. There is even speculative chatter in Silicon Valley that Zynga's best hope might be to go private again.

Twitter's employees have reason to be wary of the public market. According to The Wall Street Journal, nonexecutive employees of four big Internet companies that went public in the past 16 months have collectiv ely lost about $9 billion in paper wealth since their I.P.O.'s. At Facebook, the average rank-and-file worker has lost about $2 million on paper since the I.P.O., The Journal says, citing calculations by Equilar.

 

Tech Titans Warm to Romney  |  President Obama has a Wall Street problem in Silicon Valley. In the start-up capital, Mitt Romney and the Republican party “have made clear inroads,” reports Somini Sengupta in The New York Times. Marc Andreessen, the venture capitalist and Facebook investor, has contributed more than $100,000 to Mr. Romney this year, after backing President Obama with a $4,600 donation in 2008. Some tech investors even seem to be echoing Wall Street's complaints. “There needs to be some reaffirmation through words and deeds that engines of innovation are valued,” said Robert Nelsen, the managing director of the Seattle-based Arch Ventures.

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UnitedHealth to Buy Brazilian Healthcare Company for $4.9 Billion  |  The UnitedHealth Group agreed on Monday to buy a 90 percent stake in Amil Participações for $4.9 billion, in a deal to expand in Brazil.

 

On the Agenda  |  The bond market is closed for Columbus Day. Earnings season kicks off this week, with Alcoa reporting on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo announce results on Friday.

The founder of the Vanguard Group, John C. Bogle, is on CNBC at 12:30 p.m. Lee C. Buchheit, a top attorney at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton who has been called “the philosopher king of sovereign debt lawyers,” is on CNBC at 3 p.m. Ben S. Bernanke is visiting India through Wednesday. The European Central Bank and the Federal Reserve are holding a joint conference in Frankfurt to discuss bank financing.

 

Preparing Europe's Bailout Bazooka  |  The board overseeing the European bailout fund is having its first meeting on Monday in Luxembourg to discuss how to deploy the $650 billion fund, referred to as a “bazooka.” It should be interesting, given that there is little consensus on the details. The New York Times writes: “Euro zone member states have not yet agreed on the circumstances under which the fund will be used directly to prop up a country's commercial banks - as Spain would like - to avoid piling even more debt onto national balance sheets. And until the fund starts selling bonds, there is no way of telling whether investors will buy them.”

The political tensions are weighing on the market. Stocks fell in Europe on Monday, and the euro fell against the dollar and the yen.

 

EADS and BAE Face a Wednesday Deadline  |  The two European aerospace giants are up against a Wednesday deadline to file a merger plan. But political wrangling continues. The governments of Britain, France and Germany are haggling over “the best way to balance state interests in the merged company, either through direct ownership of shares or through the granting of special voting rights to the governments, said the people close to the negotiations,” The New York Times reports. Germany is now said to be “holding out for more,” according to Bloomberg News.

 

Bernanke on the Nationals  |  The Fed chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, wrote an essay in Saturday's Wall Street Journal professing his devotion to the Washington Nationals, and arguing that politicians could learn something from the baseball team's strategy. As if to prove Mr. Be rnanke's thesis, the Nationals eked out a victory over the St. Louis Cardinals on Sunday.

 

 

 

Mergers & Acquisitions '

Corporate Leaders Report Little Appetite for Deals  |  A survey by Ernst & Young found that just 25 percent of a group of more than 1,500 executives expected to pursue an acquisition over the next six months, the most pessimistic result since 2009, Reuters reports. REUTERS

 

Chairwoman of Avon to Step Down  |  Andrea Jung, who resigned last year as chief executive of Avon Products, said she would step down as executive chairwoman at the end of the year, The New York Times reports. NEW YORK TIMES

 

Staples Seen as a Potential Takeover Target  |  The company is now “cheaper than 93 percent of similar-sized U.S. specialty retailers, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.” BLOOMBERG NEWS

 

Hutchison to Pitch Deal to European Regulators  |  In a private hearing with European regulators on Wednesday, Hutchison 3G will argue for its proposed takeover of Orange Austria, Reuters reports, citing an unidentified person familiar with the matter. REUTERS

 

INVESTMENT BANKING '

The Return of Neuberger Berman  |  After being dragged down in the collapse of Lehman Bro thers, Neuberger Berman is “freshly invigorated and focused on the essentials in the way disaster survivors tend to be,” Barron's writes in its cover story. BARRONS

 

Investors Flock to Below-Investment-Grade Bonds  |  The popularity of high-yield bonds has pushed yields to record lows, Floyd Norris writes in his column in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES

 

Spanish Bank Depositors Cry Foul  |  Some depositors in Spain, whose banks sold them unusual investments that have fallen in value, are claiming they were not given sufficient information about the securities, The Wall Street Journal reports. WALL STREET JOURNAL

 

New Methods in Hacking Attack on Banks  |  The hackers that recently targeted big American banks used “data centers around the world that had been infected with a sophisticated form of malware that can evade detection by antivirus solutions,” the Bits blog writes. NEW YORK TIMES BITS

 

Diverse Strategies Helped 3 Mutual Funds  |  Three of the better-performing mutual funds in the third quarter invested in sectors ranging from all-terrain vehicles to European banks, The New York Times writes. NEW YORK TIMES

 

Top Goldman and Morgan Stanley Executives Said to Join Firms in Qatar  |  The top executives of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley in Qatar have departed for local firms, Reuters reports, citing three unidentified people. REUTERS

 

PRIVATE EQUITY '

Big Buyouts Remain in Private Equity Hands  |  Some of the biggest deals from the industry's “golden” years have yet to be sold, creating a situation that “could become problematic if not soon rectified,” Fortune's Dan Primack writes. FORTUNE

 

Allscripts Said to Attract Private Equity Bids  |  The Carlyle Group, the Blackstone Group and Silver Lake Management have submitted first-round bids for Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, which is considering a buyout, Bloomberg News reports, citing unidentified people familiar with the talks. BLOOMBERG NEWS

 

HHI Group to Be Sold for $750 Million  |  The private equity firm American Securities is paying cash for the HHI Group, an auto-parts supplier, The Wall Street Journal reports. WALL STREET JOURNAL

 

Britain Claims a Bigger Share of European Buyouts  | 
FINANCIAL TIMES

 

Terra Firma Said to Plan Fund for Renewable Energy  |  The private equity firm Terra Firma is working with the China Development Bank to raise up to $5 billion to invest in the renewable energy sector, Reuters reports, citing an unidentified person familiar with the situation. REUTERS

 

Zell to Name New Head of International Operations  | 
WALL STREET JOURNAL

 

HEDGE FUNDS '

An Activist Investor With a Quiet Style  |  Barry Rosenstein of Jana Partners told The Wall Street Journal: “I get a lot more out of these C.E.O.'s by not embarrassing them publicly, by not being viewed as trying to nail their scalp to the wall.” WALL STREET JOURNAL

 

Fund Reaches Deal With Wet Seal  |  The Clinton Group, which owns about 6.9 percent of Wet Seal, is installing four of its nominees on the retailer's board, The Wall Street Journal reports. WALL STREET JOURNAL < /p>

 

Hedge Funds Bid Up Commodity Prices  |  The increase in bullish bets ended a two-week rout, Bloomberg News reports. BLOOMBERG NEWS

 

I.P.O./OFFERINGS '

Chinese Telecom Giant Under Scrutiny  |  Huawei, which is said to be considering an I.P.O., is the subject of an investigation that has “raised concerns about national security, Chinese espionage, and Huawei's murky connections to the Chinese government,” reports CBS's “60 Minutes.” CBS NEWS

 

Solar Panel Company Aims to Raise $201 Million in I.P.O.  |  SolarCity, whose chairman is Elon Musk, is looking to challen ge investor skepticism about solar companies. BLOOMBERG NEWS

 

A Third of Prada Managers Depart After I.P.O.  | 
FINANCIAL TIMES

 

MegaFon of Russia May Announce I.P.O. This Week  | 
BLOOMBERG NEWS

 

VENTURE CAPITAL '

When Patents Are Used as Weapons  |  In the latest installment in the iEconomy series in The New York Times, Charles Duhigg and Steve Lohr report that the technology industry is said to have been “corrupted by software patents used as destructive weapons.” NEW YORK TIMES

 

Cash Flows Are Critical for Tesla  |  Mitt Romney recently referred to electric-car maker Tesla Motors as a loser. Sales of its sedan are strong, but a look at the company's cash flows suggests it isn't out of the woods just yet. DealBook '

 

Trinity Ventures Raising $325 Million Fund  | 
TECHCRUNCH

 

LEGAL/REGULATORY '

Lehman Units Settle $38 Billion of Claims  |  The deal was called a “cri tical milestone” by James Giddens, the trustee liquidating Lehman's brokerage unit, Reuters reports. REUTERS

 

Wall Street Regulator Ramps Up Enforcement  |  The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, once considered a toothless regulator, brought a record number of enforcement cases over the past year, as fines soared. DealBook '

 

Antitrust Questions in Apple's Use of Maps App  |  Apple's decision to go with its own maps technology in its iPhone seems like what is known as a tying arrangement, writes James B. Stewart in his column in The New York Times. “To the degree that tying arrangements extend the control of a dominant producer, they may violate antitrust laws.” NEW YORK TIMES

 

Law Firms Cut Costs From the Back Office  | 
WALL STREET JOURNAL

 

The Municipal Bond Market's Backward Ways  |  Despite attempts by regulators to force municipal bond issuers to disclose basic financial information, some “don't seem to have gotten the message. More disturbing, regulators don't seem to care,” writes Gretchen Morgenson in her column in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES

 

Outspoken Economist Takes an Indian Government Role  |  Raghuram G. Rajan, an economist who has criticized India's policy makers, was named chief economic adviser in the country's Finance Ministry, where he is looking to change India's financial system, The New York Times reports. NEW YORK TIMES