Sprint Nextel’s path to recovery once seemed clear, involving a sale to SoftBank of Japan and a deal to buy full control of the wireless network operator Clearwire. But that plan has been complicated by Dish Network, which has bid for Sprint itself and Clearwire, leaving both Sprint and SoftBank to weigh backup plans, DealBook’s Michael J. de la Merced reports.
The uncertainty comes as shareholders are preparing to vote on the transactions. Sprint shareholders are scheduled to vote on the SoftBank offer on Wednesday, though the meeting may be postponed to allow Dish more time to formalize a $25.5 billion takeover proposal for Sprint that would top SoftBank’s $20.1 billion bid. Clearwire shareholders are set to vote on Sprint’s bid on Thursday, after Dish recently raised its offer for Clearwire to $4.40 a share, compared with Sprint’s current bid of $3.40 a share.
“SoftBank has staunchly defended its bid for Sprint, repeatedly assailing Dish’s offer as unworkable, and won the conditional support of an influential shareholder advisory firm,†Mr. de la Merced reports. “But SoftBank has been laying the groundwork for a potential backup plan: It has been in talks with Deutsche Telekom about potential options for the German telecommunication concern’s majority stake in T-Mobile US, according to a person briefed on the matter.â€
GOOGLE CLOSES IN ON WAZE Â |Â Google is close to a deal to acquire Waze, a largely Israeli company with a social mapping service that reflects actual traffic information. The proposed acquisition, for a price above $1 billion, could be announced this week, according to three people with knowledge of the discussions, Vindu Goel and Claire Cain Miller report on the Bits blog of The New York Times.
“Waze, which was previously in discussions to sell itself to Facebook, attracted the interest of the bigger technology companies because of the social nature of its maps,†The Times writes. “It’s unclear whether the deal would face antitrust problems, given Google’s already strong presence in online maps.â€
PARSING A PLUNGE IN BONDS  | The month of May and the first week of June “were terrible for many fixed-income investors who have spent the last few years reaching for higher yields,†James B. Stewart writes in The New York Times. “If there was an index for fixed income with the status of the Dow Jones industrial average or Standard & Poor’s 500 index for stocks, the carnage in fixed-income markets would have been a big story and we’d all be talking about a bear market in bonds.â€
“We’ve been talking about the fact that eventually this interest rate cycle has to come to an end for the better part of six-plus months,†Gary D. Cohn, president and chief operating officer of Goldman Sachs, told Mr. Stewart. “People need to be reminded of the inverse correlation between interest rates and bond prices. The moves in interest rates may seem small, but they’re pretty powerful. There can be a dramatic impact on prices.â€
The sell-off began in May, amid concerns that the Fed might be preparing to reduce the pace of its stimulus program. Indeed, many investors “are spending a lot of energy trying to get inside the head of Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, and making bets on what they think he sees,†Nathaniel Popper writes in The New York Times. “Stocks, bonds and currencies around the globe had a chaotic week as traders and strategists reassessed how Mr. Bernanke viewed the economy and whether those views would prompt the central bank to pull back on the bond buying that has supported markets in recent years.â€
ON THE AGENDA Â |Â
A conversation on women on Wall Street, with speakers including Sallie L. Krawcheck, a former bank executive, is being held at the 92nd Street Y at 8:15 p.m. Dolly Lenz, vice chairman of Prudential Douglas Elliman, is on CNBC at 10:15 a.m.
RECUSALS SEEN FOR S.E.C. ENFORCER  | Andrew J. Ceresney, who was recently chosen as the Securities and Exchange Commission’s co-chief of enforcement, may have to navigate possible conflicts arising from his work defending Wall Street clients. Mr. Ceresney “has named 25 of his former clients, both companies and individuals, at the law firm Debevoise & Plimpton L.L.P. in the financial-disclosure report he has to file as an S.E.C. official, adding that there are a further three clients whose names he can’t disclose for legal reasons,†The Wall Street Journal reports.
Separately, the new chief counsel of the S.E.C. chairman, Robert E. Rice, who formerly was an executive at Deutsche Bank, “is the subject of a discrimination complaint from a former colleague at Deutsche Bank, who claims he was fired for blowing the whistle on fraud,†The Financial Times reports. “Eric Ben-Artzi, a former Deutsche risk manager, filed a discrimination complaint with the U.S. Department of Labor last year, alleging he was fired after telling the S.E.C. that Germany’s biggest bank had hidden billions of dollars of losses with mismarked derivatives positions.â€
AstraZeneca in Deal for Pearl Therapeutics  | The latest acquisition, worth up to $1.15 billion, is part of efforts by AstraZeneca to restock its drug pipeline after its established products have come under threat from makers of generic drugs. DealBook »
Bidders for British Utility Threaten to Walk Away From Offer  | The battle for control of the water utility Severn Trent continued after the investment group that offered $8.2 billion to buy the company said it would walk away unless Severn Trent entered into discussions. DealBook »
IHS to Buy Owner of Carfax Used-Car Data Service  | IHS said on Sunday that it had agreed to buy the parent company of Carfax, a provider of used-car data. Terms of the deal for R.L. Polk & Company, which is privately held, were not disclosed. DealBook »
Royalty Pharma Raises Its Bid for Elan Again  | Royalty Pharma increased its hostile takeover offer for Elan, the Irish drug company, on Friday for the second time in a month after it failed to get enough support from Elan’s shareholders. DealBook »
Berkshire Said to Be Interested in Unipol Assets  | Berkshire Hathaway is looking at assets that Unipol, an Italian insurer, must sell as part of its merger with Fondiaria-SAI, the Italian newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore reported, according to Reuters. REUTERS
Wal-Mart Annual Meeting Sticks to a Narrow Script  | The New York Times writes: “There were two Wal-Marts on display at the company’s shareholder meeting on Friday: the one Wal-Mart presented, and the one some investors and activists were complaining about.†NEW YORK TIMES
Debt Fuels Acquisitions by Thai Tycoons  | Reuters writes: “Two Thai business tycoons, one a politically connected Chinese speaker, the other the son of a street vendor, have spent $27 billion on acquisitions in the past year, mainly abroad â€" more than all Thai firms spent overseas in the previous three years.†REUTERS
The Lesson From the Coup at Timken  | Ralph Whitworth persuaded fellow shareholders to approve his ballot campaign to break up the steel and ball bearing manufacturer Timken, Jeffrey Goldfarb of Reuters Breakingviews writes. REUTERS BREAKINGVIEWS
BNP Said to Plan Merger of American Units  | The Financial Times reports: “BNP Paribas is planning a full-blown merger of its U.S. operations as it attempts to offset the impact of threatened US regulatory reforms for foreign banks, according to people familiar with the project.†FINANCIAL TIMES
R.B.S. Chief Reflects on His ‘Mission’  | Stephen Hester, the head of the Royal Bank of Scotland, which is still majority-owned by the British government, tells The Financial Times that he took the job as a “mission.†He continues: “I hate not winning, I hate it.†FINANCIAL TIMES
Britain Said to Plan to Sell Bank Shares  | The British government plans to sell shares in the Lloyds Banking Group, seeking to raise up to £17 billion, The Sunday Times reports. SUNDAY TIMES
Europe’s Second Chance to Fix Banks  | “The European Central Bank now has a golden opportunity to press the reset button in advance of taking on the job of banking supervisor in mid-2014. It must not flunk the cleanup,†Hugo Dixon of Reuters writes. REUTERS
A Million-Dollar Illusion for Retirees  | “Consider this bleak picture: A typical 65-year-old couple with $1 million in tax-free municipal bonds want to retire. They plan to withdraw 4 percent of their savings a year â€" a common, rule-of-thumb drawdown. But under current conditions, if they spend that $40,000 a year, adjusted for inflation, there is a 72 percent probability that they will run through their bond portfolio before they die,†Jeff Sommer writes in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES
Truly Great Companies Add More Than They Extract  | In an increasingly complex world, a truly great company must value all stakeholders - employees, customers, suppliers, the community and the planet - to generate the greatest value over the longest term, Tony Schwartz writes in the Life@Work column. DealBook »
Leaker’s Employer in the Business of Keeping Government Secrets  | Booz Allen Hamilton, the employer of the whistle-blower Edward J. Snowden, “has become one of the largest and most profitable corporations in the United States almost exclusively by serving a single client: the government of the United States,†The New York Times writes. The firm was bought by the Carlyle Group in 2008 and taken public in 2010. NEW YORK TIMES
Paulson Shows Gains in Main Funds  | Reuters reports: “Hedge fund manager John Paulson reported strong returns in his largest funds last month as bets on deals and distressed debt are paying off and boosting several of his portfolios to double digit gains so far this year.†REUTERS
Uncertain Times for Funds of Hedge Funds  |Â
FINANCIAL TIMES
Terra Firma Plans Offering of German Landlord  | The private equity firm Terra Firma Capital Partners “plans to sell about 25 percent of Deutsche Annington Immobilien in the German residential property market’s second initial public offering of the year,†Bloomberg News reports. BLOOMBERG NEWS
AirAsia X Seeks Up to $370 Million in I.P.O. Â |Â The Malaysian airline AirAsia X kicked off its I.P.O. on Monday. REUTERS
Online Privacy Fears Shake Tech Industry  | “The dreamers, brains and cranks who built the Internet hoped it would be a tool of liberation and knowledge. Last week, an altogether bleaker vision emerged with new revelations of how the United States government is using it as a monitoring and tracking device,†The New York Times writes. “In Silicon Valley, a place not used to second-guessing the bright future it is eternally building, there was a palpable sense of dismay.†NEW YORK TIMES
Pairing Recent Graduates With Investors  | A site called Upstart pairs investors with people who finished college or graduate school after 2008, who are “looking for relatively small amounts of money, about $25,000 on average, to finance their idea or even pay off debt,†Paul Sullivan writes in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES
Criminal Defense Lawyer Closes Office to Join a Big Firm  | After representing Mafia bosses and corrupt politicians, Gerald Shargel, a 68-year-old criminal defense lawyer, will close his offices to join Winston & Strawn. DealBook »
Fund Manager Settles Case in Dell Insider Trading Ring  | Victor Dosti, a portfolio manager at the Whittier Trust Company, is the ninth person to be charged relating to the Dell trade. DealBook »
Baby Steps for S.E.C. Plan on Money Market Funds  | The proposal by Mary Jo White, head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, to overhaul money market funds, is much more incremental than her predecessor’s, Gretchen Morgenson writes in The New York Times. NEW YORK TIMES
Weighing Fed Policy from Sturgeon Bay, Wis.  | Paul Kasriel has a yardstick that helps him assess whether the Federal Reserve’s extraordinary stimulus will lead to economic growth. DealBook »
Rengan Rajaratnam Cuts Own Path in Plea Talks  | Federal prosecutors would have reason to seek his cooperation, but the chances of that happening as part of any plea accord seem slim. DealBook »
