Goldman’s Earnings Show Strength

Goldman Sachs on Tuesday reported profit of $2.2 billion in the first quarter, driven by strength in investment banking and lending. The earnings of $4.29 a share represented a 9 percent increase from the quarter a year earlier. The results beat analysts’ expectations of $3.89 a share, according to Thomson Reuters. “Our strong client franchise across our businesses drove generally solid results. Still, the potential for macroeconomic instability was felt in the quarter and constrained overall corporate and investor activity,” Lloyd C. Blankfein, Goldman’s chairman and chief executive, said in a statement. Goldman’s stock rose slightly in premarket trading on Tuesday. A conference call to discuss the results is being held at 9:30 a.m.

DISH AIMS TO COMBINE PHONE AND TV  |  With a $25.5 billion bid for Sprint Nextel, the pay-TV operator Dish Network wants to roll television, high-speed Internet and cellphone services into a single package. The proposal, according to Charles W. Ergen, Dish Network’s chairman, “really means that we’re going to give consumers what every consumer wants.” The bid is an attempt to scuttle the planned takeover of Sprint by the Japanese telecommunications company SoftBank; Dish said its cash-and-stock deal is worth about 13 percent more than the SoftBank bid.

SoftBank struck back on Tuesday, saying in a brief statement that its offer represented better value for shareholders than Dish Network’s “highly conditional preliminary proposal.” But markets appeared to disagree, as shares in SoftBank fell 6.8 percent in trading in Tokyo on Tuesday.

Another question is whether such consolidation is good for customers. A Dish-Sprint merger could pose a greater challenge to AT&T and Verizon, the two giants of the industry, analysts said. But it would also weaken T-Mobile USA, the No. 4 carrier.

ENERGY FUTURE HOLDINGS OFFERS BANKRUPTCY PLAN  |  Energy Future Holdings has a plan to resolve its troubles, but creditors apparently are less than enthusiastic. The Texas energy giant, which was taken private in 2007 in the largest buyout ever, disclosed on Monday a potential bankruptcy plan to its creditors, proposing to restructure about $32 billion in debt. But creditors rejected the plan, according to The Financial Times.

The proposal is “the opening move in what many say could be a long and contentious battle between the company and its largest creditors,” Julie Creswell writes in DealBook.

ON THE AGENDA  | 
BlackRock and Coca-Cola report earnings before the market opens, while Intel and Yahoo announce results this evening. Laurence Fink, chief executive of BlackRock, is on CNBC at 3:10 p.m. Sheila Bair, the former chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, is on Bloomberg TV at 7:30 a.m. The International Monetary Fund releases its World Economic Outlook at 9 a.m. A House Financial Services subcommittee holds a hearing at 2 p.m. on too-big-to-fail institutions. The Consumer Price Index for March is out at 8:30 a.m. Data on housing starts for March is released at 8:30 a.m.

GOLD TAKES A PLUNGE  | 
Gold prices fell 9 percent on Monday, the steepest drop in 30 years, “heightening fears that investors’ faith in the safe haven has been shattered,” Nathaniel Popper writes in DealBook. The fall, which led to a broader sell-off in commodities and stock markets, was apparently catalyzed by disappointment over Chinese growth. “The price of the metal has been undergoing an extraordinary reversal from a decade-long rally. Since reaching a high of $1,888 an ounce in August 2011, gold has been on a downward slope. The decline picked up pace on Friday, when gold fell 4 percent, officially taking it into a bear market, which is defined as a 20 percent drop from its recent high.”

Mergers & Acquisitions »

Glencore-Xstrata Deal Said to Win Approval in China  |  With approval from Chinese authorities, Glencore has “cleared the final regulatory hurdle in its $30 billion takeover of Xstrata,” according to Bloomberg News, which cites three unidentified people with knowledge of the matter.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

AMR Submits Plan to Leave Bankruptcy  |  The filing by AMR, the parent of American Airlines, brings the company closer to finalizing a merger with US Airways.
REUTERS

Nestle to Sell Pfizer Business in Mexico  |  Mexican authorities accepted a proposal by Nestlé to sell the Pfizer baby formula business in Mexico, to address competition concerns, The Wall Street Journal reports.
WALL STREET JOURNAL

Pre-emptive Moves Should Help J.C. Penney Shore Up Cash Position  |  The decision to borrow $850 million from a credit line now, rather than later in the year when cash use spikes, suggests a particularly bad start to the year.
News Analysis »

Thermo Fisher Reaches Deal for Rival in Gene Sequencing Equipment  |  Thermo Fisher agreed to buy rival Life Technologies for $13.6 billion, a move that will expand its market share in the production of genetic sequencing machines.
DealBook »

INVESTMENT BANKING »

UBS Lures European Deal Maker Away From Nomura  |  William Vereker, the former joint head of global investment banking at Nomura, has joined UBS as head of corporate client solutions in Europe.
DealBook »

A Merger Monday for Barclays  |  By advising Dish Network and Thermo Fisher Scientific on two large deals, the investment bank takes a big jump up the M.&A. league table.
DealBook »

Goldman Sachs and A.I.G., Together Again  |  “For those who follow bailout sagas, the idea of a Goldman bankers handling A.I.G.’s bailout repayment and being congratulated by a former government official has a certain degree of irony,” Lauren Tara LaCapra writes on Reuters’s Unstructured Finance blog.
REUTERS

American Express Names Edward Gilligan President  | 
WALL STREET JOURNAL

As Citigroup’s Profit Surges, Skittish Borrowers Hurt the Consumer Unit  |  Citigroup reported first-quarter profit of $3.8 billion, exceeding analysts’ estimates, as the bank continued to reduce costs and unload troubled assets.
DealBook »

PRIVATE EQUITY »

The Top 10 Private Equity Loopholes  |  April 15 is a good day to reflect on how much you pay in taxes and what you receive in return. It’s also good to think about how your tax rate compares with what the private equity industry pays, Victor Fleischer writes in the Standard Deduction column.
DealBook »

Bain Capital Said to Attract $3 Billion for New Fund  | 
FORTUNE

K.K.R. Executive Discusses Deal for First Data  |  Scott Nuttall, head of global capital and asset management at K.K.R., recalls in a video for Privcap that when the private equity firm first looked at First Data, the credit card processor, “the senior management team was not on speaking terms at the time.”
PRIVCAP

HEDGE FUNDS »

Gold’s Fall Weighs on Paulson  |  “Hedge-fund manager John Paulson’s wager on gold wiped out almost $1 billion of his personal wealth in the past two trading days as the precious metal plummeted 13 percent,” Bloomberg News reports.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Rothschild Seeks to Build Fund-of-Funds Business  |  Rothschild is on the lookout for an acquisition in the United States to help it grow its business that invests in hedge funds, Reuters reports.
REUTERS

I.P.O./OFFERINGS »

In I.P.O., Fairway Seeks Premium to Rivals  |  The New York grocery store chain Fairway “is seeking to go public at a valuation that’s more expensive than peers including Whole Foods Market,” Bloomberg News reports.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

VENTURE CAPITAL »

Start-Up Lets You Track Who Tracks You  |  A start-up called Disconnect offers a browser connection that “is meant to block an invisible network of around 2,000 separate tracking companies,” the Bits blog writes.
NEW YORK TIMES BITS

Spotify Announces Plans to Expand in Latin America and Asia  | 
WALL STREET JOURNAL

LEGAL/REGULATORY »

Italian Prosecutors Seize Nomura Assets  |  Prosecutors in Siena “are seizing about 1.8 billion euros ($2.3 billion) of assets from Nomura Holdings” as part of an inquiry into derivatives used by Monte dei Paschi di Siena, Bloomberg News reports.
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Regulators Said to Fault JPMorgan Over Madoff Activity  |  Reuters reports: “Regulators plan to fault JPMorgan Chase & Co, which served as Bernie Madoff’s main bank for two decades, for failing to conduct adequate due diligence and report suspicious activity, according to a person familiar with the matter.”
REUTERS

Ex-Rochdale Trader Admits to Unauthorized Apple Trade  |  David Miller, the former Rochdale Securities trader whose purchase of about $1 billion of Apple stock led to the demise of his employer, pleaded guilty to wire fraud and conspiracy, Reuters reports.
REUTERS

With White at S.E.C., Debevoise Picks a Successor  |  Debevoise & Plimpton has named Mary Beth Hogan as co-chair of its litigation department, a job that was formerly held by Mary Jo White, now the chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
DealBook »

Greece Reaches Deal for More Rescue Money  | 
NEW YORK TIMES

Challenges Mount for China’s President  |  Reports of infections and deaths from the H7N9 bird flu virus grow, while the economy shows signs of sputtering, Bill Bishop writes in the China Insider column.
DealBook »

French Officials, Under Orders, Disclose Financial Worth  | 
NEW YORK TIMES