Opening Bell: 01.04.11

Moynihan Fights Fire At Bank Of America Amid Book Value Doubts (Bloomberg)
“Brian’s got his hands totally full dealing with the internal issues and the external focus on some of the problems of the company,” Stephen A. Schwarzman, CEO of Blackstone Group LP, the world’s biggest buyout firm, said in an interview. “He is in firefighter mode, dealing with fires that will be contained but need attention.”

Illinois Has Days To Plus A $13 Billion Deficit That Took Years To Build (Bloomberg)
Anyone have any tips?

Blackbirds Died Of Blunt Trauma Mid-Air (KUAR)
Keith Stephens of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission says between 4,000 and 5,000 of the birds are now believed to have rained on New Year’s Eve. “There was a lot of trauma in the breast tissue, blood clots in the body cavity and internal bleeding,” Stephens says. “So, it looks like maybe they got startled, they may have flown into each other, flown into a house, flown into a tree. They don’t have very good night vision,” he says, “and maybe they ran into each other, fell to the ground and died.”

Buffett Locks In Rates on New Bonds Amid Rising Yields (Bloomberg)
A unit of Buffett’s Omaha, Nebraska-based holding company issued $750 million of 4.25 percent, 10-year notes yesterday priced to yield 95 basis points more than similar-maturity Treasuries, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It also sold $375 million of three-year, 1.5 percent notes and the same amount of floating-rate debt yielding 33 basis points more than the three-month London interbank offered rate, the data show. “The market scrutinizes Buffett’s moves very closely and this would indicate he’s thinking interest rates in the longer term may go up,” Vijay Chander, Hong Kong-based head of credit strategy at Standard Chartered Plc, said in a phone interview.

Cash Keeps Facebook's Status Private (WSJ)
Who's excited for the days/weeks/months of headlines incorporating Facebook terms?

Goldman Investment in Facebook May Draw SEC Scrutiny (Bloomberg)
Goldman Sachs invested $450 million in Facebook and is planning to create a special purpose vehicle for its clients to make additional investments worth as much as $1.5 billion. Some private companies avoid crossing the disclosure threshold when investors’ funds are channeled through a single entity, such as a private equity firm or hedge fund. “The real question is, what are the details of this special purpose vehicle?” said James Angel, a finance professor at Georgetown University’s business school in Washington. If the investment is designed to circumvent the rule, “the SEC should be looking very closely at it.”

Facebook May Not Be The Next Google (FT)
Oh, he went there.

US to Detail Pentagon Savings, Cuts (Reuters)
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates is expected to announce as early as Thursday about $100 billion in savings for the Pentagon and cuts to some weapons programs

Bankruptcy Filings Leapt 9 Percent (WSJ)
Personal bankruptcies rose to 1.53 million, up 9% from 2009, the highest level since a revamp of the law took effect in 2005, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute, an association of attorneys and other bankruptcy professionals, and the National Bankruptcy Research Center.