$$$ As His Fraud Trial Opens, Ex-UBS Trader Is Accused of Brazen Gambling [DealBook] $$$ Thanks, Goldman, for Giving My Peers Their Lives Back [Bloomberg] $$$ FDIC’s Hoenig Wants Simpler Rules Than Basel III [Deal Journal] $$$ Occupy Wall Street's one-year anniversary demonstrations start tomorrow [The Awl] $$$ Hard-money types talk too much about the gold standard, not enough about the bacon standard [CNBC] $$$ "I'm kind of a Snooki fan. Look how tiny's she's gotten. She's lost weight. She's energetic. Just her spark-plug personality is kind of fun." - Mitt Romney [DI] $$$ TIAA-CREF is looking for an insurance wholesaling director in Boston [DBCC] $$$ Miller Says U.S. Should Issue Simplified Volcker Rule [Bloomberg] $$$ Private equity needs more strategic deals [Term Sheet] $$$ Home Depot is leaving China, "where cheap labor has stunted the do-it-yourself ethos and apartment-based living leaves scarce demand for products like lumber" [WSJ] $$$ Allocating Risk Through Contract: Evidence from M&A and Policy Implications [Harvard Law] $$$ Naked German monk found wandering Bavarian forest after tripping on some bad berries [NYDN]

$$$ Rick Santorum drops out of the presidential race [WaPo] $$$ Alcoa Posts Surprise Profit After Aluminum Orders Climb [Bloomberg] $$$ Hedge funds lag the market, again [Fortune] $$$ Dan Loeb has convinced Yahoo that it's time to move forward with some buzzwords [AllThingsD] $$$ "The conventional wisdom that Facebook sees Instagram as competition is not the whole story. It may also see Instagram as particularly advertiser-friendly content that its users currently have trouble producing. Think of it as a $1 billion way to make your parents’ status updates more interesting." [Reuters / Ryan McCarthy] $$$ Interested in behavioral economics? Then don't buy Karl Daniels's Fast and Slow Thinking. [Language Log] $$$ Mitt Romney Is Doing ‘Gay Voice’ in This Video, Says Professional Gay Voice Expert Bob Corff [Gawker] $$$ How would you like to be a portfolio management associate at Starwood Capital in Greenwich? [DBCC] $$$ NY pushes objection to BofA $8.5 billion mortgage pact [Reuters] $$$ "Court: Checking Facebook on Your Work Computer Isn't a Crime." Other courts disagree. [WSJ Law Blog] $$$ "For the first time in its 4 1/2 year life, a program on the Fox Business Network has topped a show on CNBC for an entire week in both Total Viewers and younger viewers." [TVNewser via Talking Biz News] $$$ What Do Europe's Pirate Parties Stand for? [Bloomberg] $$$ This happened [BI] $$$ Mayonnaise Store Now Open in Prospect Heights [Brownstoner] $$$ 5-year-old brings heroin for 'show and tell' [Stamford Advocate]

$$$ Julius Baer to buy Merrill Lynch arm [FT] $$$ Groupon Shares Fall 14% on Slower Growth [WSJ] $$$ "Finally, and contrary to popular belief, [shadow] banking increases transparency and disclosure because banks now sell assets that would otherwise be hosted on their opaque balance sheets." [St. Louis Fed] $$$ Skepticism about proposed Libor fixes [Sober Look] $$$ Meet Chick-Felays, the Tiny Canadian Restaurant That Wants You to Know It Has No Opinion on Marriage Equality [Grub Street] $$$ Aboard his campaign plane Friday evening, Romney told reporters: “Bus tour, it’s great! It’s great to be out campaigning. . . . Campaigning is the most fun, is the most enjoyable and rewarding.” Romney then clapped his hands and returned to his seat at the front of the plane. “Back to my yogurt,” he said. [WaPo via Unfogged] $$$ T. Rowe Price is looking for an assistant corporate secretary, if you're interested [DBCC] $$$ Earnings report articles are kinda pointless [Reuters / Felix Salmon] $$$ The Wall Street Journal is pretty pleased with its Olympic forecasting [WSJ] $$$ ‘Fierce Five’ Gymnasts Face Hurdle In Landing Nickname Trademark [Bloomberg] $$$ "What does it mean that, say, David Koch could double each half of the GOP ticket’s net worth by giving Romney one-hundredth of his fortune, or giving Ryan one five-thousandth of his fortune?" [Concurring Opinions] $$$ HuffPost Live Presents John Cusack’s Rambling Thoughts On The Mortgage Crisis [NYO]

$$$ Something something something ECB bond-buying [FT] $$$ Banker Bonuses At Risk As EU Lawmakers Fight Barnier Plans [Bloomberg] $$$ Yelp Surges After Lockup Expires [DealBook] $$$ M&A volumes are down but at least there are a lot of small deals [DealBook] $$$ People prefer potential success to actual success in hiring [HBR] $$$ "At each of its most efficient restaurants, Chipotle averages more than 350 transactions during the lunch hour — about one every 11 seconds." [WSJ, related?] $$$ Prudential is looking for a fixed income senior associate [DBCC] $$$ Greg Fleming won't run E*Trade [Term Sheet] $$$ "The interests of PE firms and their investors do not coincide with the companies that have been taken over, not in the way that Romney and his adherents would have you believe." Matt Taibbi gropes toward a theory of the corporation. [RS] $$$ Bond-Trading Firm Gleacher Said To Seek Buyer [Bloomberg] $$$ Barack Obama does a Reddit AskMeAnything, doesn't really answer anything [Reddit] $$$ Romney Party Yacht Flies Cayman Islands Flag [ABC]

$$$ America's Richest Hedge Fund Managers [Forbes] $$$ Blankfein, No Socialist, Sees Flaws in Wealth Distribution [Bloomberg] $$$ Deposit Flight From Europe Banks Eroding Common Currency [Bloomberg] $$$ Disabled Employee Says Bank of America Fired Him for Slow Typing and Walking, "was repeatedly told that accommodating him 'wouldn't be fair to people with two hands.'" [ABC] $$$ Yarr, avast mateys, etc. [Language Log] $$$ A regional broker/dealer located in midtown is looking for a junior analyst/intern to assist in analysis and model development within their renewable energy group focusing on solar PV project finance [DBCC] $$$ Corporate Credit Craze Speaks to Weakness, Not Strength [CNBC] $$$ SEC you later, pal! Schapiro may be heading for the exit [NYP] $$$ Anthony Scaramucci still believes in Mitt Romney's campaign [BI] $$$ Romney Apologizes To Nation's 150 Million 'Starving, Filthy Beggars' [The Onion] $$$ Anti-Semitic Elmo, Back to His Old Ways, Arrested in Times Square [DI]

$$$ Athens faces tough bail-out terms [FT] $$$ ECB to Exchange Greek Bonds [WSJ] $$$ I give up, what would you do about Greece? [Crooked Timber] $$$ Yelp Sets Terms for March IPO [WSJ, possibly related] $$$ Goldman hires Harvard students because Harvard is bad at educating them [Bloomberg / Ezra Klein, possibly related] $$$ Australia's richest person wrote the universe's worst poem ("Develop North Australia, embrace multiculturalism and welcome short term foreign workers to our shores / To benefit from the export of our minerals and ores" etc.) [Telegraph via The Jane Dough] $$$ You could be a Credit Risk Senior Analyst at Genworth in Stamford [eFinancialCareers] $$$ Icahn Offers to Buy CVR Energy in at Least $2.6 Billion Deal [Bloomberg] $$$ The SEC raised the qualifications for being charged 2 and 20 [SEC] $$$ Merrill brokers are fine selling bad advice but draw the line at selling BofA banking services [Reuters / Felix Salmon] $$$ Welcome to six months ago Art Cashin. Some tips: buy NFLX; don't take any Tuscan cruises. [MarketBeat] $$$ Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore wants to end the default practice of quarterly earnings guidance and explore issuing loyalty-driven securities as part of an overhaul of capitalism which he says has turned many of the world's largest economies into hotbeds of irresponsible short-term investment. [Reuters] $$$ Toddler Rescued From Inside Claw Game [ABC]

SunEdison files for Chapter 11; BNY Mellon rises; Blackstone plummets; London restaurant to encourage nude dining; and more.

$$$ Facebook Posts Loss, But Emphasizes Mobile Growth $$$ LightSquared Executives Get $6 Million in Bonuses Approved by Judge [Deal Journal] $$$ Bernanke QE3 Stocks Miss Greenspan Irrational Exuberance [Bloomberg] $$$ ‘I’m Quite Concerned About Fiscal Cliff’: Greenspan [CNBC] $$$ Argentina won't kneel down before 'vulture funds,' says Cabinet Chief [BA Herald] $$$ Gupta is no Rajaratnam. Gupta tipped inside information about one company to Rajaratnam, while Rajaratnam traded on confidential information collected from many sources. So you’d expect that Gupta would be treated differently when he appears for sentencing. Federal sentencing guidelines, however, suggest a prison term for him that’s similar in length to the 11 years Rajaratnam is serving. And prosecutors want a sentence within those guidelines, just as they want for the hundreds of defendants sentenced in federal courts nationwide every day. Because what Gupta and Rajaratnam did is so different, though, sentencing Gupta to anything like the time Rajaratnam is serving undermines the whole purpose of the sentencing scheme that prosecutors say they want to uphold. [Slate] $$$ For several years now, Marc Lasry, the co-founder of Avenue Capital, has decorated his mansion on East 74th Street with bloodied bodies hanging from the balcony, skeleton heads, a giant inflatable ghost, swinging bats and a life-size, clothed skeleton affixed to a tree on the sidewalk. One afternoon last week, tourists and children gathered to take pictures of a dancing skeleton beside the front door. It was singing “Super Freak.” (Perhaps in the spirit of competition, the hedge fund manager Philip A. Falcone and his wife, Lisa Maria, have lavishly decorated the exterior of their 27,525-square-foot house on East 67th Street even though it is currently a construction site.) [NYT via BI] $$$ Adveq, a leading asset manager investing in private equity and real asset funds globally, is looking for an investor relations and development representative for North America [DBCC] $$$ Former Soros CIO nears launch of Anderson Global Macro early next year [AR] $$$ Wall Street Is Rethinking Commodity-Trading Role [WSJ] $$$ This is a story about LBO companies getting equity financing from long-only investors to pay down debt to manageable levels before an IPO [Term Sheet] $$$ This is a story about a management consultant who is also a self-published poet [BBW] $$$ "My wife ... penetrated to the heart of the debate in a single sentence tonight when, only about 15 minutes into the exchange, she observed: 'Romney’s flag pin is much larger than Obama’s flag pin.'" [NR] $$$ Obama Takes Out Romney With Mid-Debate Drone Attack [The Onion] $$$ NYC-Based Soup Chain Offers Free Cup of Soup, Personal Service from a ‘Cunt’ Named Mary [Gawker]