Houlihan Lockey fizzles; Shake Shack slides; GM ramps up; Minions are smuggling cocaine; and more.

$$$ Catalonia Asks Spanish Government for Emergency Funds [NYT] $$$ Asia's Tide of Cash Hems in Policy Makers [WSJ] $$$ Morgan Stanley Win On Brokerage Would Be Pyrrhic Victory [Bloomberg] $$$ Paulson Assures Bank of America in Call [WSJ] $$$ "When I asked a PE tax attorney if what Bain is doing is allowed, she told me that 'allowed' and 'not allowed' isn't always the right way to think about it." Tax lawyers! [Term Sheet] $$$ The CFA Institute comes out against Great Idea Corp. [Forbes] $$$ Shia LaBeouf Got Into Character for Upcoming Film by Dropping Acid On Set [Gawker] $$$ William Blair is looking for an experienced associate for its technology investment banking group in San Francisco [DBCC] $$$ S.E.C. Charges 8 With Insider Trading in Sanofi Deal [DealBook] $$$ ISM sells a low-latency feed of its business data to Reuters [MarketBeat] $$$ “There’s an idea that when a lawyer or law firms are going to get a big payment, that there’s something somehow wrong about that, just because it’s a lawyer. I’m sorry, but investment banks have hit it big, a lot bigger the plaintiffs’ lawyer firms have hit it big. They’ve hit it big many times.” This Law Blog story on the Grupo Mexico verdict is kind of amazing. [WSJ Law Blog] $$$ Wall Street Rocker Gary Marks Settles With SEC Over Whether Knew What He Was Talking About [NYO] $$$ "There were no workers that were forced to attend the event. We had managers that communicated to our work force that the attendance at the Romney event was mandatory, but no one was forced to attend the event." [Raw Story] $$$ Hitler clothing store in India asked to change name [JTA]

$$$ You can still drink big sodas [NYP] $$$ Bank compensation up in 2012 despite cutback efforts [Reuters] $$$ Morgan Stanley Set to Name Kaminsky Brokerage Vice Chair [FBN] $$$ Mary Schapiro Is Nominated to G.E. Board [DealBook] $$$ The life cycle of the investment banker [TED] $$$ City high-flier 'was called crazy Miss Cokehead by work bullies after she blew whistle on insider dealing' [DM] $$$ Brookfield Investment Management is looking for a global infrastructure securities analyst in Chicago [DBCC] $$$ Europe trading tax would kill repo market -industry official [Reuters] $$$ SAC Capital Manager’s Tipper Deserves Prison, U.S. Says [Bloomberg] $$$ "Long term shareholders are well served by activism" [Aswath Damodaran] $$$ "Callan hardly needs advice from me but I'll offer it anyway. She may want to consider that her lack of satisfaction with her life's direction is not a product of the choices she made. Instead, her choices may have been a product of her lack of satisfaction. In my experience, the kind of people who can rise to the level she did at a relatively early age tend to be filling a hole in their psyche, an indistinguishable yearning for something more that is experienced as a kind of pain." [NetNet / John Carney] $$$ Corey Robin went to school with Bill[y] Ackman [Corey Robin]

$$$ S.E.C. Enforcement Chief Khuzami Steps Down [DealBook] $$$ Dimon Says JPMorgan Executives ‘Acted Like Children’ on Loss [Bloomberg] $$$ S.E.C. Opens Investigation Into Herbalife [DealBook] $$$ Here you can watch an inspirational video about Herbalife called "Our Herbalife" [YouTube] $$$ "It doesn't travel as a coin. It stays in a container. And the container itself is small enough to carry, but certainly not small enough to put in your pocket. That's kind of how we protect it. So once you put it in the container, it kind of moves in the container. And probably we'd keep it in a container even at Fort Knox. I remember when I was in the military, the keys in the orderly room were on a long stick, like a broomstick. And I said to the sergeant, how come you do that, and he said, "So nobody can put it in their pocket." That's kind of how you do security [for a trillion-dollar coin] also." [DI] $$$ RBC is looking for an analyst for its Derivatives Solutions Group in New York [DBCC] $$$ Soros Hong Kong portfolio manager Jixin Dai departs, plots standalone fund [AR] $$$ SEC Claims KPMG Auditors Failed to Scrutinize Nebraska Bank [Bloomberg] $$$ "For people like me, on the other hand, the economy is a social system, created by and for people. Money is a social contrivance and convenience that makes this social system work better — and should be adjusted, both in quantity and in characteristics, whenever there is compelling evidence that this would lead to better outcomes." [Paul Krugman] $$$ Apparently people read Business Insider in bed [BI]

$$$ Hopes for central bank action mount [FT] $$$ Mohamed El-Erian: "There is only so much central banks can do" [FT] $$$ Got Cash in Greek Banks? Don't Pull It! [NetNet] $$$ Hedge fund closures hit 2-year high in 1st quarter [Reuters] $$$ A "driven, even obsessive entrepreneur with a proclivity for micromanagement" who is unlikely to take his company public [NYTM] $$$ Also, bath salts [Spin] $$$ "Looking like Jesus can have a very powerful effect on people. When I appeared on stage as Jesus for the first time, a man saw me and collapsed into tears. Looking like this in daily life can be interesting. When I go into bars, for example, I always see people nudging each other. Invariably someone will come up to me with a bottle of water and ask me to turn it into wine. That happens a lot. I was on a date once in a wine bar, and we ended up with three tables joined together with everyone wanting to re-enact the Last Supper using the wine and the bread. It was strange, but fortunately the girl I was with thought it was fun." [FT] $$$ MetLife is looking for an associate director level credit derivatives trader in New Jersey [DBCC] $$$ In Motion, Facebook Lays Out Defense and Highlights Nasdaq’s Missteps [DealBook] $$$ Gupta Jurors Saw American Dream and Convicted [Bloomberg] $$$ The JPMorgan Whale’s regulatory motive [FTAV] $$$ "Can We Watch Some European Football Please?" asks Jim O'Neill [GSAM] $$$ The NFL will let fans pay for All-22 footage [WSJ] $$$ For one protester, 'Occupy' becomes a way of life [Reuters]

$$$ Spain's Recession to Linger as Austerity Bites [WSJ] $$$ Euro Bailout Bid Gets Vote Of No-Confidence [Bloomberg] $$$ As the Justice Department weighs the possibility of criminal charges in the unfolding Libor rate-setting scandal, it may want to consider the record of the Swiss banking giant UBS. At UBS, a series of immunity, nonprosecution and deferred prosecution agreements in recent years — evidently the government’s preferred approach to corporate crime — seems to have had scant, if any, deterrent effect. “It’s depressing,” Representative Peter Welch, Democrat of Vermont, a member of the House oversight committee, told me this week after we discussed UBS’s recent transgressions. “The Justice Department has to decide: Is the day of consent decrees and settlements, where you pay a fine, one passed on to shareholders, are those days over? Are the days of jail time here?” [NYT] $$$ Jamie Dimon Opens Wallet For JPMorgan Shares, Picks Up 500000‎ [Forbes] $$$ Someone stole hundreds of David Hasseloff life-sized cutouts [NYDN] $$$ Credit Suisse chair says board backs Dougan [Reuters] $$$ Ex-BofA Executive Indicted For Fraud In Municipal Bond Probe [Bloomberg] $$$ BMW ‘stolen’ from Hooters is found [WaPo]

$$$ European Economic Outlook Dims Amid Leaders’ Impasse [NYT] $$$ U.S. Bank Lending Falls, Profits Rise [WSJ] $$$ Buffett’s Goldman Deal Is Topic in an Insider Case [DealBook] $$$ Study Finds Germans Incapable of Enjoying Life [Der Spiegel] $$$ This happened: New York nun asks Blankfein if he'll hire her, Blankfein says "I don't think I couldoutbid your current employer" #godswork— Tracy Alloway (@tracyalloway) May 24, 2012 $$$ Man who formerly claimed to be a "certified member of the quiet society of pimps" and asked to be certified as an expert witness in pimpology now says "I was a failure as a pimp. I was a much better car salesman, I was a much better telemarketer, I was much better when I was selling mortgages by phone. I really wasn't very good at it. A lot of it was exaggerated." [NYP, earlier] $$$ A leading electronic trading platform is looking for a CDS / fixed income sales associate [DBCC] $$$ Big European funds dump euro assets [FT] $$$ Facebook market makers' losses total at least $100 million [Reuters] $$$ This is some enjoyable Eliot Spitzer schadenfreude [Concurring Opinions] $$$ "The festival features 10 different types of bacon, plus all things bacon — bacon sausage, bacon meatballs, bacon doughnuts, bacon butterscotch cupcakes — even a walking slab of bacon! There’s a bacon-eating contest, bacon lectures and a bacon song contest — and yes, there’s a crowning of the Bacon Queen! Contestants are asked questions like their favorite memory of bacon, their favorite kind of bacon and their favorite way to cook bacon (the most common answer is “naked,” incidentally)." [CNBC] $$$ Unabomber lists self as ‘prisoner’ in Harvard directory [Boston Globe]

Greece must jump hoops for cash; Biotech bidding war; Bitcoins; "New Mexico School To Hold 'Prom-munism': Communism-themed Dance"; AND MORE.