SAC’s Cohen Selling Art

As his legal troubles have deepened, the hedge fund billionaire Steven A. Cohen has sold stocks to meet withdrawal requests from investors. Now Mr. Cohen, the owner of SAC Capital Advisors, is also selling significant works of art from his celebrated collection, Peter Lattman and Carol Vogel report in DealBook.

He has put two major paintings by Andy Warhol and an abstract canvas by Gerhard Richter up for sale, according to art experts familiar with his holdings. Sotheby’s will auction the works at next month’s contemporary art auction in New York, DealBook reports. The two Warhols, both painted in 1963, are “Liz #1 (early Colored Liz),” an image of Elizabeth Taylor expected to sell for $20 million to $30 million, and “5 Deaths on Turquoise (Turquoise Disaster),” thought to bring in $7 million to $10 million. “People familiar with Mr. Cohen’s collection said that these paintings were part of a larger group of his works being put up for auction.”

WORLD LEADERS PRESS U.S. ON FISCAL CRISIS  | Leaders at World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings on Sunday said the United States must raise its debt ceiling and reopen its government or risk “massive disruption the world over,” as Christine Lagarde, the fund’s managing director, put it. The government’s fiscal problems overshadowed the official agendas for the meetings, Annie Lowrey and Nathaniel Popper report in The New York Times. Though the leaders came to Washington to talk about the international recovery, “they found out that the debt ceiling was the issue,” Ms. Lagarde said in an interview on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.”

With only three days remaining before the United States might be unable to pay its bills, Senate Democratic leaders â€" believing they have a political advantage â€" refused on Sunday to sign on to any deal that reopens the government but locks in budget cuts for next year, Jonathan Weisman reports in The Times. “The core of the dispute is about spending, and how long a stopgap measure that would reopen the government should last. Democrats want the across-the-board cuts known as sequestration to last only through mid-November; Republicans want them to last as long as possible.”

JPMORGAN’S LOSS IS LAW FIRMS’ GAIN  | The announcement by JPMorgan Chase on Friday that it had set aside $9.2 billion to cover its mounting legal expenses â€" leading it to report its first quarterly loss under Jamie Dimon â€" underscored how the bank’s legal woes are proving to be a boon for the country’s most sophisticated law firms, Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Peter Lattman report in DealBook. Mr. Dimon, the chief executive, described the legal expenses on Friday as “painful,” but that pain is profit for law firms like Sullivan & Cromwell; Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison; and WilmerHale.

“Even as defense lawyers publicly complain that government regulators are being too aggressive, they privately celebrate the windfall. Law firms in New York and Washington are collectively earning many hundreds of millions of dollars representing JPMorgan in cases ranging from weak controls against money laundering to commodities trading, according to interviews with senior partners at several of top firms,” DealBook writes.

ON THE AGENDA  |  The bond market is closed for Columbus Day. Richard Kovacevich, a former chief of Wells Fargo, is on CNBC at 5 p.m.

3 WIN NOBEL IN ECONOMICS  |  Eugene F. Fama and Lars Peter Hansen, both of the University of Chicago, and Robert J. Shiller of Yale are the recipients of this year’s Nobel in economic science “for their empirical analysis of asset prices,” the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced on Monday. The three have done work in forecasting the prices of assets over periods of several years, but they have come to very different conclusions. “No one saw these guys sharing a prize,” the economist Justin Wolfers said on Twitter.

DE BLASIO MEETS WARY WALL ST.  | Bill de Blasio, the populist insurgent and sudden mayoral front-runner, recently was courting an unlikely constituency: New York City’s plutocratic class, Michael M. Grynbaum and Susanne Craig report in The New York Times. Before an audience of moguls and financiers rattled by his anticorporate rhetoric, Mr. de Blasio, a left-leaning Democrat, tried to reassure them that he was not plotting to go to war with them.

“Wall Street is our hometown industry,” Mr. de Blasio told the group, according to several attendees at the lunch in the glassy headquarters of Viacom near Times Square. The executives, who included Lloyd C. Blankfein, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, told friends later that Mr. de Blasio’s remarks were somewhat reassuring. But the talk did not erase all their worries, The Times writes.

Mergers & Acquisitions »

Booker’s Start-Up Is Sold  |  Waywire, the video start-up associated with Newark’s mayor, Cory Booker, is being sold to Magnify, a Web video distributor, AllThingsD reports. ALLTHINGSD

Facebook Buys Israeli Mobile Analytics Start-Up  |  Facebook said it had bought Onavo, a start-up based in Tel Aviv, with plans to turn the company’s headquarters into Facebook’s new Israeli office, AllThingsD reports. ALLTHINGSD

TD Bank Said to Consider Bid for R.B.S. Unit  |  Canada’s Toronto-Dominion Bank is considering a bid worth about $12.8 billion for the American retail banking business of the Royal Bank of Scotland, The Sunday Times reported, according to Reuters. REUTERS

Huawei of China Said to Rule Out Big Deals  |  Huawei, a giant maker of telecommunications equipment, is not planning any big takeovers because of the difficulty of integrating them with the company, a deputy chairman, Guo Ping, was quoted as saying in a German paper, according to Reuters. REUTERS

Philadelphia Newspaper’s Owners Feuding  |  At The Philadelphia Inquirer, “the promise of an ownership group with deep pockets and an agenda driven by civic purpose collapsed in an unsightly heap last week,” David Carr writes in the Media Equation column in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES

Activision Closes Deal for Most of Vivendi’s Stake  |  A day after the Delaware Supreme Court struck down an injunction, the video game maker Activision Blizzard completed an $8.2 billion transaction with Vivendi. DealBook »

In a Bid for Men’s Wearhouse, a Merger Battle With Modern Strategies  |  While Men’s Wearhouse is currently saying no to a merger with Jos. A. Bank, it may soon find itself pressured by the new shareholder forces in our capital markets, Steven M. Davidoff writes in the Deal Professor column. DealBook »

INVESTMENT BANKING »

Weak Bank Revenues Show the Tough Road Back for the Economy  |  Low interest rates are crimping a major source of bank profits. But higher rates are not necessarily the answer either â€" for the banks or the economy. DealBook »

Wells Fargo Quarterly Earnings Jump 13%  |  The nation’s largest home lender reported record profit on Friday even as a slowdown in the mortgage market muted the bank’s growth. DealBook »

At Citi, Pandit Is Gone but Is Still Serving the Bank’s Shareholders  |  Michael L. Corbat has accelerated some cost cuts and clarified strategy around the edges, but the bank’s broad direction was already in place and is serving shareholders well, Rob Cox and Antony Currie of Reuters Breakingviews write. REUTERS BREAKINGVIEWS

As Deals Disappoint, Banks in Asia Advertise Other Businesses  |  “As investment banking in Asia suffers its worst year since 2009, instead of proclaiming their work on the latest I.P.O. or merger deal, banks are touting their success in grind-it-out businesses like cash management and cross-border transactions,” The Wall Street Journal reports. WALL STREET JOURNAL

Why C.E.O. Compensation Keeps Rising  |  “Relying on peer-group comparisons, the way boards do, mathematically guarantees that pay is going to go up,” Charles Elson, a corporate governance expert, told The New Yorker’s James Surowiecki. “Higher pay becomes a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy.” NEW YORKER

Activity Does Not Always Equal Productivity  |  True productivity means finding the right balance between taking care of what is truly urgent and focusing on what is less pressing but will most likely add the most enduring value, Tony Schwartz writes in the Life@Work column. DealBook »

PRIVATE EQUITY »

Private Equity’s Taste for Frozen Yogurt  |  Private equity firms have invested heavily in frozen yogurt chains since 2007, contributing to the industry’s growth across the country, CNBC reports. CNBC

HEDGE FUNDS »

Hedge Fund Ads? Not So Fast  |  “Hedge funds and private equity groups have not flocked to market their businesses to wealthy individuals, despite the lifting of a longtime ban on advertising to US investors,” The Financial Times reports. FINANCIAL TIMES

I.P.O./OFFERINGS »

Twitter Said to Arrange $1 Billion Credit Line  |  Twitter, as it prepare to go public, is “nearing completion of a $1 billion credit line from its bankers that it can use to help finance its growth,” The Wall Street Journal reports. The company is said to be paying its bankers fees of 3.25 percent, “the lowest percentage paid on a U.S.-listed I.P.O. in more than a year.” WALL STREET JOURNAL

Royal Mail Shares Surge in Debut  |  A 38 percent increase reignites criticism that the government sold a majority of Britain’s main postal service too cheaply. DealBook »

Strong Demand for Royal Mail Stock May Not Translate to Lloyds Shares  |  The Lloyds Banking Group may be tempted to focus its next share sale on retail customers after strong demand for the postal service’s shares. But the differences between the two offerings warrant a different approach, George Hay of Reuters Breakingviews writes. REUTERS BREAKINGVIEWS

Europe’s I.P.O. Market Looks Attractive to Investors  |  “These days, investors seeking the boldest menu of initial public offerings need a taste for the Old World,” The Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street column writes. WALL STREET JOURNAL

VENTURE CAPITAL »

Twitter Co-Founder Plots His Next Move  |  Jack Dorsey, a co-founder of Twitter and the chief executive of Square, tells The New Yorker: “Twitter is about moving words. Square is about moving money.” NEW YORKER

LEGAL/REGULATORY »

When the Doctor Prescribes Credit  |  “In dentists’ and doctors’ offices, hearing aid centers and pain clinics, American health care is forging a lucrative alliance with American finance,” Jessica Silver-Greenberg reports in The New York Times. “A growing number of health care professionals are urging patients to pay for treatment not covered by their insurance plans with credit cards and lines of credit that can be arranged quickly in the provider’s office.” NEW YORK TIMES

Are Competing Bankruptcy Plans a Good Thing?  |  As LightSquared’s creditors get prepared to consider which of four reorganization plans to vote for, it bears noting how much Chapter 11 has been changed by the 2005 amendments to the bankruptcy code, Stephen J. Lubben writes in the In Debt column. DealBook »

Yellen on Gender  |  Janet L. Yellen, President Obama’s choice to lead the Federal Reserve, has occasionally been asked about being a female economist in a male-dominated field. NEW YORK TIMES

In Ailing Detroit, Prosperity for Sports Teams  |  “Detroit’s glittering sports teams operate in a different economy than does the rest of the city,” The New York Times writes. NEW YORK TIMES