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Electronics maker Panasonic today launched a tender offer to acquire more than 50% in rival Sanyo, aiming to make the company a subsidiary in a deal worth 400 billion yen (US$4.44B). Panasonic decided to make an offer for Sanyo last year, aiming to gain access to the electronic maker’s Green battery technology. Sanyo develops solar-cell technology and batteries for hybrid cars. If the deal goes through, the new company will be Japan’s second-largest electronics maker, after Sony.

The offer is on the table until December 7, but with Goldman Sachs, Daiwa Securities and the Sumitomo-Mitsui group all signaling they will agree to sell their shares, Panasonic is likely to see the deal go through. Panasonic is willing to pay 131 yen per share, but Sanyo was trading at 216 yen per share on Wednesday. After news of the tender offer broke, the value of single Sanyo shares dropped to 192 yen. Read more

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Goldman Sachs Group Inc’s trading operations helped the dominant Wall Street firm quadruple its earnings, but investment banking results were not as exciting and its shares sold off a bit on the report. Goldman’s compensation packages have drawn some scrutiny, but stayed on to hand out more than US$20B in Y 2009 bonuses, the equivalent to more than US$630,000 per employee and is likely beat a record set for compensation in 2007. The report noted that Goldman’s investment banking and asset management revenues were lower. The bank fell to No. 2, behind Morgan Stanley, in M&A adviser rankings for deals announced globally through Q-3 according to Thomson Reuters. Goldie also dropped a spot to No. 7 in global capital markets. Fixed income, currency and commodities (FICC) trading nearly quadrupled, helping propel overall revenue to a forecast beating US$12.37B. However, the US$5.99B in FICC revenue, driven by credit products and mortgages, lagged Q-2 and fell short of some analysts’ high expectations. Read more

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Goldman Sachs stands to receive a payment of US$1B, while US taxpayers would lose US$2.3B, if the embattled commercial lender CIT files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, LTN learned today. The payment is based on the structure of a US$3B rescue finance package that Goldman extended to CIT on June 6 2008, about five months before the Treasury bought US$2.3B in CIT preferred shares to prop it up at the height of the US financial crisis. The potential loss for taxpayers would be the biggest so far from the government’s capital injection plan for banks. The agreement with Goldman states that if CIT defaults or goes bankrupt, it “would be required to pay a “make whole” amount that totals US$1B, people familiar with the transaction said. While Goldman is entitled to demand the full amount, it is likely to agree to postpone payment on a part the amount. Read more

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China’s economy showed new signs today that its recovery is gaining with the announcement that investment, industrial output and credit all expanded rapidly in August 2009 The increases in output and investment were both ahead of analysts’ forecasts and followed a series of figures in July which suggested the recovery might be weakening. The one exception was on the trade front where the decline in exports and imports compared to the year before was sharper than expected. “The combination of strong growth and still deep deflation shows that the V-shaped recovery is on track, while inflation pressure remains subdued,” said Sun Mingchun, economist at Nomura International. Read more

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Nokia, the world’s largest handset maker yesterday unveiled its first phone running on Linux software with the plan to improve its offerings at the top end of the market. The focus of cell phone business worldwide has shifted to services and software following Apple and Google’s entrances to the market in the last two years.The Finnish firm has been looking for business opportunities from offering services like music downloads or games to cell phone users as the handset market itself is maturing, but to date its offerings have gained limited traction. Read more

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Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase Co. have emerged two bellwethers of the US finance sector in the post-bailout Wall Street, leading the surge of optimism with their strong profits in the Y 2009 Q-2. Six major US banks have reported their second-quarter profits in the past two weeks, vastly beating analyst predictions. The business of Goldman has little to do with common consumers, its quarterly earnings of more than US$3.4B posted were buoyed by record results in its trading and underwriting business. According to the quarterly report, the Wall Street giant generated a record US$6.8B in revenue from fixed income, currency and commodities trading during the quarter. Revenue from equity underwriting jumped to US$736M form UD$ 48M in the first quarter compared with US$616M last year. JP Morgan Chase, the largest US bank by market value, posted a US$2.72B earnings, and made its profits mainly from investment-banking services including bond and equity trading, and underwriting debt to help companies issue shares and bonds, not commercial loans and consumption credit.

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