♦ Treasury officials say as many as 1,800 institutions may apply for government investments in the next few weeks. [WSJ]
♦ GM hasn't been so lucky extracting cash: The Treasury has turned down a request by the automaker for $10 billion to help finance a merger with Chrysler. [NYT]
♦ Henry Kravis's KKR is delaying its plan to go public on the NYSE until 2009. [CNNMoney]
One more sign that these are tough economic times: more and more women are selling their eggs for cash. According to fertility specialists, the number of women willing to go through with the ordeal of hormone treatments and fertility drugs has risen 30 to 40 percent over the past few months as more women are tempted by the a payday that can be between $5,000 and $10,000. The trend isn't limited to eggs. Sperm donations are up, too, which may explain what former Lehman Brothers bankers have been doing as of late (when they're not selling stuff on Ebay, of course). [ABC News]
♦ Bad day ahead? Stocks fell sharply in Europe and Asia overnight and ugly corporate earnings have investors worried. [MW]
♦ Wachovia, which is being acquired by Wells Fargo, reported a third-quarter loss of $23.9 billion. [Bloomberg]
♦ Yahoo says it will lay off 10 percent of its work force. [NYT]
♦ Federal prosecutors looking into the collapse of Lehman have subpoenaed other firms to find out if their analysts were misled by Lehman execs. [WSJ]
As is our custom, we gave Dick Fuld a call this afternoon to see how his brave assistant was holding up. And what do you know? The disgraced chief executive of Lehman Brothers wasn't in the office when we called at two o'clock, nor was his assistant. She was picking up the phone yesterday. Today? Voicemail! Good night and good luck, Dick. Hopefully, we'll get a chance to see you again soon (in Foley Square, quite likely) in the near future.
♦ Prosecutors have subpoenaed a dozen Lehman executives, including Dick Fuld, as part of three grand jury probes into the bankruptcy of the investment bank. [NYP]
♦ Warren Buffett has faith: "Buy American. I am." [NYT]
♦ Andrew Cuomo met with AIG's new CEO yesterday, who assured the attorney general the insurance giant would account for excessive executive compensation and will also cancel upcoming conferences. [NYT, Bloomberg]
The Hong Kong-based clothing retailer Giordano International—"the Gap of Asia"—has a new line of crisis-themed t-shirts planned for Halloween. Think it's in poor taste? Not at all. It's supposedly designed to cheer you up. "Giordano has chosen a brainy way to lift spirits with 'Halloween HalloTees' that are equally stylish, casual and spooky," the company said in an official statement.
New York's Steve Fishman casts further doubt on the rumor that Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld was punched in the face at the company gym just after the bank filed for bankruptcy. The evidence is pretty conclusive, too: The episode was supposed to have taken place on a Sunday, but Lehman's gym isn't even open on Sunday. [Daily Intel, previously]
♦ How did Hank Paulson's negotiations with the CEOs of the nation's largest banks go down on Monday? There were no negotiations, actually. He handed them a term sheet and told them to sign it on the spot if they knew what was good for them. [WSJ, NYT]
♦ Whether or not the federal government make actually make money taking a take in all these banks is still up in the air. [NYT]
♦ Will the bailout really change the way Wall Street CEOs are paid? Nah. They "will find other creative ways of paying their executives as they see fit." Which means Lloyd Blankfein will still take home tens of millions. [NYT, Bloomberg]
♦ The credit markets thawed ever so slightly yesterday following the news the U.S. government would take a stake in major banks. It could take weeks or months for things to really improve, though. [WSJ]
You don't have to just rely on the government to fix the economy. You can play a part, too, by lending a helping hand to a former employee of Lehman Brothers. How, you ask? By picking up some of the junk ex-Lehmanites are now selling on Ebay. On sale today: a Lehman Brothers evacuation kit, which was handed out to employees after the attacks of Sept. 11 (but clearly wasn't much help when it came to evacuating employees from the credit crisis); a Lehman mousepad, which comes along with a snazzy pen; a Lehman lanyard which you can use to hang an ID card around your neck (and which, if you don't buy, could very well be turned into a noose in the near future); and this card which was used in the Lehman Brothers cafe at 745 Seventh Avenue: "Like Lehman Brothers, this card has no more remaining value."
♦ Citigroup dropped efforts to block a deal between Wachovia and Wells Fargo yesterday afternoon; it will, however, continue to press ahead with its $60 billion lawsuit. [NYT, WSJ]
♦ Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack is back on the defensive today after the bank's shares dropped nearly 26 percent yesterday to $12.45, the lowest closing price in a decade. [DB, WSJ]
♦ Barclays, which acquired the assets of Lehman Brothers last month, now plans to cut another 3,000 jobs. [Fortune]
Lehman Brothers was one of the investors who put $12 million into MyShape, an online clothing store. Lehman Brothers, the bankrupt investment bank? Yes; its VC arm, Lehman Brothers Venture Partners, had committed to the investment in August, before its parent company collapsed. The venture group, which had raised $1.1 billion and invested $717 million of that, is negotiating to spin out of Lehman as an independent firm.
Lawyers at the firm Weil Gotshal will make as much as $950 an hour to work on the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, the largest in U.S. history. The total bill for lawyers from three dozen different firms, hundreds of accountants, and countless financial advisers? Possibly as high as $1 billion. [Bloomberg via DB]
A few weeks ago, a rumor surfaced that disgraced Lehman CEO Dick Fuld had been punched in the face and "knocked out cold" in the company gym just after it was announced that the firm would file for bankruptcy. Yesterday Vanity Fair's Vicki Ward said she had two very reliable sources confirming the events. Today, Lehman denied the rumor, calling it "completely absurd and completely untrue." CNBC's Charlie Gasparino thinks they're all full of shit, as he explains in the video below.
So is it Lee-man Brothers or Lay-man Brothers? It's pronounced "Lee-man," for your information, a point you might want to pass along to Rep. Henry Waxman, who pummeled Dick Fuld yesterday while mispronouncing the name of the firm the entire time. But he's not the only one! John McCain has repeatedly referred to it as "Lay-man" Brothers in recent days, too. They may have a defense, though. Although Merriam-Webster has it right, the online pronunciation guide Forvo.com has it wrong. Although to Forvo.com's credit, though, they did manage to get JP Morgan, Goldman, Sachs, Wells Fargo, and Wachovia pronounced correctly.
♦ Invoking emergency powers, the Fed will create a special fund to buy up commercial paper—short-term debt that companies typically use for such things as payroll—in an effort to ease up the credit markets. [Bloomberg]
♦ Wachovia and its sparring suitors, Citigroup and Wells Fargo, have agreed to a two-day truce as negotiators try to work out a resolution. [WSJ, DB]
♦ Did you miss Lehman CEO Dick Fuld's testimony before the House yesterday? A recap. [WSJ, FT, NYT]
♦ Bank of America reports that profits plunged 68% in the third quarter. [CNNMoney]
Lehman CEO Dick Fuld spoke before the House a few minutes ago and answered questions about the demise of his firm as well as assumed reponsibility for making mistakes that resulted in Lehman's bankruptcy. ("With the benefit of hindsight, I can now say that I and many others were wrong," said Fuld.) He also faced tough questions about his compensation package at the hands of Rep. Henry Waxman. A brief clip of the Waxman-Fuld showdown is above.
Tomorrow is Dick Fuld's last day in the corner office on the 31st floor of 745 Seventh Avenue. On Monday, according to the Journal, he's moving to the space Lehman has set aside for "back-office personnel" at 1271 Sixth Avenue. That may explain why his perky assistant (here and here) is no longer taking Dick's calls and his much more somber one (here) has returned to the scene. It also explains why she sounds more depressed than ever, which is how you'd probably feel, too, if you had to give up a cushy office suite to sit in a cube next to a tech support staffer.
♦ Now comes the hard part. After winning the vote in the Senate last night, the bailout bill will head to the House for a Friday vote. [NYT, WSJ]
♦ John Thain will be staying put at Bank of America, contrary to initial rumors. He'll become the combined company's president of global banking, securities and wealth management. Who wants to hunt for a job in this economy? [MW]
♦ "Warren Buffett has become the new triple-A credit rating system." [NYT]
♦ Dick Fuld's last day in his corner office may come tomorrow. [WSJ]
♦ First-time applications for unemployment benefits rose to the highest level in seven years. [Bloomberg]
