Ackman Vs. Icahn, the Rematch

ACKMAN VS. ICAHN, THE REMATCH  |  A high-profile feud on Wall Street went another round on Thursday, when the hedge fund manager William A. Ackman responded to comments by Carl C. Icahn. In a scathing news release, Mr. Ackman questioned his opponent’s integrity after Mr. Icahn publicly criticized Mr. Ackman’s method in betting against Herbalife, a nutritional supplements company.

“Carl Icahn is a great investor, but, in my experience, he does not keep his word,” Mr. Ackman said in the statement.

The spat began when Mr. Icahn, who was reported to have bought a stake in Herbalife, took aim at Mr. Ackman in an interview with Bloomberg TV. “It’s no secret I don’t like Ackman. I don’t respect him, and I don’t like him,” Mr. Icahn said. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to go in and buy stock in a company necessarily just to get him.” Saying Mr. Ackman had a “holier than thou” attitude, Mr. Icahn criticized how his opponent assembled a “roomful of people to badmouth the company,” referring to Herbalife.

Mr. Ackman, who runs Pershing Square Capital Management, began his own attack. In the release, he rehashed his version of what transpired in a previous battle between the two investors that was resolved in 2011: “After Carl paid my investors, he called me up, congratulated me on winning, and said that he wanted to be my friend. I told him that I had no interest in being his fr! iend.“

PAY CUT FOR MORGAN STANLEY C.E.O.  |  James P. Gorman, the chief executive of Morgan Stanley, is expected to take another pay cut, after his firm posted a mixed financial performance for the year, DealBook’s Susanne Craig reports. “Mr. Gorman’s compensation for last year is estimated to be slightly less than the $10.5 million he took home in 2011, according to a person briefed on the matter. His 2011 pay was down 25 percent from the previous year.”

“The total value of Mr. Gorman’s compensation package for 2012 is not yet known, but according to a regulatory filing on Thursday, the bank’s board awarded him stock options valued at $2.6 million, on top of his base salary of $800,000. He is expected to earn another $2.6 million in deferred cash, according to this person, who spokeon condition of anonymity because some of the compensation details are not yet public.”

A SIGNAL TO WALL STREET IN OBAMA’S PICK FOR S.E.C.  |  By tapping Mary Jo White, a former prosecutor, to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, President Obama “showed a renewed resolve to hold Wall Street accountable for wrongdoing,” Ben Protess and Benjamin Weiser write in DealBook. Ms. White went after financial wrongdoing as the United States attorney in Manhattan, securing a $340 million fine against Daiwa Bank and winning the conviction of Patrick R. Bennett in a nearly $700 million fraud. The appointment of Ms. White, who also became well known for prosecuting terrorists, “may be analogous to bringing a bazook! a to a kn! ife fight,” as Peter J. Henning put it in the White Collar Watch column.

But consumer advocates may be concerned about the other part of Ms. White’s career, when she represented Kenneth D. Lewis, a former chief of Bank of America, and other big Wall Street names. At the same time, translating the president’s message into action “will not be easy, given the complexities of the market and Wall Street’s aggressive nature,” Mr. Protess and Mr. Weiser write.

Mr. Obama on Thursday also renominated Richard Cordray as the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a position he has held for the last year under a temporary recess appointment. A former attorney general of Ohio, Mr. Cordray has a record of going after big banks, earning the nickname “the Midwestern sheriff of Wall Street.”

ON THE AGENDA  | /span> Today is expected to be Timothy F. Geithner’s last as Treasury secretary. Honeywell and Procter & Gamble are among the companies reporting earnings this morning. Lloyd C. Blankfein, Goldman Sachs’s chief executive, is on CNBC at 8 a.m. Sean Parker, a founder of Napster and former president of Facebook, is on CNBC at 8:15 a.m. A panel including Brian T. Moynihan of Bank of America, Anshu Jain of Deutsche Bank and Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Associates will be broadcast on Bloomberg TV at 8:45 a.m. Bill Gates is on CNBC at 4:30 p.m.

IN SHORT: GRAY BEARD AT GOLDMAN  |  Christine Harper of Bloomberg News provides an update from Davos on Mr. Blankfein: “Goldman Sachs’s Blankfein has a beard, which he tells me is the ‘wrong color’ (gray).”

CHALLENGES OF LEAVING WALL STREET FOR TECH  |  As more financiers jump to the technology sector, some are finding that their background, typically considered an asset in the corporate world, can be a liability. Some do not know how to write computer code. Others are ill-prepared for the penny-pinching and frustration of start-up life. In short, they have trouble persuading the Silicon Valley establishment that they have what it takes to nurture a young company. “We start a little skeptical of someone from a finance background,” said Eric Paley of Founder Collective. “It’s the lack of having to create something for a customer, find the market opportunity and persevere through it with very, very low economics.”

Mergers & Acquisitions Â'

Push for Gender Balance on Boards Gains Momentum  |  The New York Times reports: “The proportion of women taking positions on corporate boards in the European Union is rising at the fastest pace in a decade as a push for laws on gender balance gains momentum, the bloc’s top justice official said Thursday.”
NEW YORK TIMES

Cisco Agrees to Sell Linksys to Belkin  |  Cisco Systems “agreed to sell its home-networking business, including the well-known Linksys brand, to Belkin International Inc., as it continues to retrench around its core business of selling technology to businesses,” T! he Wall S! treet Journal writes. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
WALL STREET JOURNAL

Lenovo Has Its Eye on Research in Motion  |  “We are looking at all opportunities â€" RIM and many others,” Wong Wai Ming, the chief financial officer of the Lenovo Group, said in reference to the maker of the BlackBerry.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Freeport-McMoRan’s Deal Spurs Lawsuits Against Directors  |  Lawsuits connected to Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold’s $9 billion deal to buy two energy companies accuse directors “of paying too litle for McMoRan Exploration Co and Plains Exploration & Production Co, as well as paying too much,” Reuters writes.
REUTERS

Novartis Chief Says Selling Stake in Roche Would Be Unattractive  |  Reuters reports: “Novartis Chief Executive Joe Jimenez played down talk that it was looking to sell its one-third voting stake in crosstown rival Roche, and certainly not at its current market price.”
REUTERS

INVESTMENT B! ANKING Â'!

Goldman’s Cohn Warns of a Bubble in Credit  |  Gary Cohn, Goldman Sachs’s president, “warned of a potential drop in fixed-income prices as bankers and policy makers in Davos celebrated surging demand for financial assets,” Bloomberg News reports.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Goldman Overcomes Its Latest Headache  |  A case brought by the founders of Dragon Systems was among a spate of legal problems and public relations difficulties for Goldman in recent years.
DealBook Â'

Deutsche Bank Claws Back a Trader’s Pay  |  Christian Bittar, who was one of the best-paid traders at Deutsche Bank, “lost about 40 million euros ($53 million) in bonuses after he was fired for trying to rig interest rates, three people with knowledge of the move said,” Bloomberg News reports.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Greenhill Results a Positive Omen for M.&A. Boutiques  |  Greenhill reported a 4 percent drop in advisory revenue last year, a week after larger rivals JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley posted much larger declines. It’s a good sign for smaller shops if they can handle a weak! er market! as well as a strong one, Antony Currie of Reuters Breakingviews writes.
DealBook Â'

In Davos, Meetings Behind Closed Doors  |  Between panel discussions at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday, some financial chieftans were spotted gathering for a private discussion.
DealBook Â'

PRIVATE EQUITY Â'

For Dell, a Silver Lake Bid May Stand Alone  |  Reuters reports: “A potential bid by private equity firm Silver Lake and its prtners to take Dell Inc private is unlikely to be topped by other investors, people familiar with the matter said.”
REUTERS

JPMorgan, as Adviser, Opts Not to Provide Financing in Dell Deal  |  JPMorgan Chase, which is advising Dell directors in a possible buyout of the company, is not among the banks arranging financing, “partly because people at the bank and at Dell wanted to avoid conflict allegations, according to people familiar with the matter,” The Wall Street Journal reports.
WALL STREET JOURNAL

Carlyle Benefits From Cheap Financing in DuPont Deal  |  For the Carlyle Group’s proposed purchase of a unit of DuPont, banks put together a financing package with a rate that “one industry participant” said “is unusually low for a leveraged buyout deal, partly because of historic rate lows,” The Wall Street Journal writes.
WALL STREET JOURNAL

HEDGE FUNDS Â'

Hedge Funds on the Line as Apple Falls  |  Apple’s stock, which fell sharply as the company reported disappointing earnings, has been a favorite among hedge fund managers, Forbes writes.
FORBES

Soros Predicts Euro Will Survive  |  Bloomberg News reports: “George Soros, one of the most outspoken critics of Germany’s proposed austerity policies to solve the European debt crisis, said the euro is here to stay and will gain as other nations seek to devalue their currencies.”
BLOOMBERG NEWS

I.P.O./OFFERINGS Â'

British Investors Support Push to Change I.P.O. Rules  |  The Financial Times reports: “Some of the UK’s ! biggest i! nvestors are backing calls by one of the most influential fund managers in the City for sweeping reforms of the initial public offering market. Legal & General Investment Management, which owns about 4 percent of the UK stock market, is seeking measures to improve ailing investor confidence in equity offerings.”
FINANCIAL TIMES

VENTURE CAPITAL Â'

In France, Twitter’s Latest Fight Over Speech  |  The New York Times reports: “A French court on Thursday told Twitter to identify people who had posted anti-Semitic and racist entries on the social network. Twitter is not sure it will comply. And the case is yet another dust-up in the struggle over spech on the Internet, and which countries’ laws prevail.”
NEW YORK TIMES

Twitter’s New Video Sharing Service  |  Vine, Twitter’s new service that lets users shoot and share video clips, had “a few serious privacy hiccups,” the Bits blog reports.
NEW YORK TIMES BITS

A Fresh Approach to Social Commerce  |  A start-up called Wanelo has a similar aesthetic to other shopping sites, with an important difference: “clicking on an image takes you directly to the place where it’s av! ailable f! or sale â€" not another blog, image site or Pinterest post,” the Bits blog writes.
NEW YORK TIMES BITS

LEGAL/REGULATORY Â'

Cities Pressure Pension Funds to Divest From Gun Makers  |  The New York Times reports: “Fresh from persuading a $5 billion pension fund in Chicago to divest from companies that make firearms, the city’s mayor, Rahm Emanuel, on Thursday urged the chief executives of two major banks to stop financing companies ‘that profit from gun violence.’”
NEW YORK IMES

HCA Is Ordered to Pay Foundation $162 Million  |  The New York Times reports: “HCA, the nation’s largest profit-making hospital chain, was ordered on Thursday to pay $162 million after a judge in Missouri ruled that it had failed to abide by an agreement to make improvements to dilapidated hospitals that it bought in the Kansas City area several years ago.”
NEW YORK TIMES

Commissioner Overseeing MF Global Inquiry at C.F.T.C. Abruptly Quits  |  Jill E. Sommers, a Republican regulator overseeing the investigation into MF Global’s collapse, has resigned her post at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
DealBook Â'

In Davos, Merkel Presses Leaders to Keep Focus on Economy  |  Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, echoed a concern that a tentative European recovery could be undercut by political complacency.
DealBook Â'

Jones Day Names M.&A. Partner to Head New York Office  |  The law firm Jones Day said on Thursday that Wesley R. Johnson, a lawyer who has orked on a number of deals involving French companies, would lead the firm’s New York office.
DealBook Â'