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NEW YORK--Jun. 4, 2009-- American International Group, Inc. (AIG) announced today that an underwritten public offering of 26 million shares of Transatlantic Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: TRH) common stock owned by AIG and its subsidiary, American Home Assurance Company (AHAC), was priced at a public offering price of $38.00 per share. The underwriters will have a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 3.9 million shares of TRH common stock from AHAC. TRH will not sell any shares in the offering.

J.P. Morgan Securities Inc., Goldman, Sachs & Co., and Morgan Stanley & Co. Incorporated are joint book-running managers with Lazard Capital Markets LLC as co-lead underwriter. Dowling & Partners and Fox-Pitt Kelton Cochran Caronia Waller are acting as co-managers of the offering.    » read more »

Double-Digit Growth Year-Over-Year Across All Global Trading Venues; U.S. Cash Volumes Up 40.4%; European Cash Volumes Up 14.6%

June 5, 2009 – NYSE Euronext (NYX) today announced trading volumes for its global cash equities and derivatives exchanges for May 2009[1]. For the month of May 2009, all NYSE Euronext global trading venues experienced double-digit year-over-year trading volume growth, including a 40.4% increase in U.S. cash trading, a 14.6% increase in European cash trading, a 28.4% increase in European derivatives volumes driven by our Bclear OTC service and a 73.4% increase in U.S. equity options.

Highlights    » read more »

New York , June 4, 2009 – NYSE Euronext (NYX) today announced that Barclays Capital has expanded its presence on NYSE Arca options by becoming a Lead Market Maker (LMM ). Barclays Capital operates market making business on both NYSE Arca and NYSE Amex options, where it is also a specialist, as well as their equities-based Designated Market Maker (DMM ) business on the NYSE.    » read more »

CHICAGO, June 4 -- CME Group today announced the launch of clearing services for 18 new, financially-settled, electricity swap futures contracts through CME ClearPort®, a set of flexible clearing services open to over the counter (OTC) market participants to substantially mitigate counterparty risk and provide capital efficiencies across asset classes.

Beginning on June 14 for trade date June 15, 16 ERCOT and two Midwest ISO swap futures contracts will be listed for trading by NYMEX through CME ClearPort, and are subject to NYMEX rules and regulations.

The new contracts and their commodity codes are:

* ERCOT Houston Zone MCPE 50 MW Peak Swap Futures (2N)
* ERCOT Houston Zone MCPE 50 MW Off-Peak Swap Futures (2W)    » read more »

Former CEO Angelo Mozilo Additionally Charged With Insider Trading

Washington, D.C., June 4, 2009 — The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged former Countrywide Financial CEO Angelo Mozilo and two other former executives with securities fraud for deliberately misleading investors about the significant credit risks being taken in efforts to build and maintain the company's market share.

Mozilo was additionally charged with insider trading for selling his Countrywide stock based on non-public information for nearly $140 million in profits.    » read more »

San Francisco -- June 4, 2009 -- Wachovia Preferred Funding Corp. (NYSE: WNAPr) announced today that its board of directors has declared a regular quarterly dividend on its Series A 7.25% preferred securities. The dividend is equal to $0.453125 per Series A security.

The dividend is payable on June 30, 2009, to holders of record as of the close of business on June 15, 2009.

Wachovia Preferred Funding Corp. (NYSE: WNAPr) is an indirect subsidiary of Wells Fargo & Company and is qualified as a real estate investment trust for federal income tax purposes.

Source: Wells Fargo & Company

June 4, 2009 -- NEW YORK - The Board of Directors of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) today declared a quarterly dividend of 46 cents per outstanding share, unchanged from the previous quarter.

The dividend is payable on Aug. 3, to Verizon Communications shareowners of record at the close of business on July 10.

In 2008, the company paid dividends totaling $5.0 billion. Verizon has approximately 2.4 million shareowners and approximately 2.8 billion shares of common stock outstanding.

Source: Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Washington, D.C., June 3, 2009 — Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro today announced the formation of an Investor Advisory Committee to give investors a greater voice in the Commission's work. SEC Commissioner Luis A. Aguilar will serve as the Commission's primary sponsor of the Committee.

"Through this well-respected and diverse group, we are reaching out to investors in a new and significant way," said Chairman Schapiro. "I look forward to hearing their views on new products, trading strategies, fee structures, and the effectiveness of disclosure, among other issues."    » read more »

Washington, D.C., June 3, 2009 — The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced finalized settlements with Bank of America, RBC Capital Markets, and Deutsche Bank to resolve SEC charges that the firms misled investors regarding the liquidity risks associated with auction rate securities (ARS) that they underwrote, marketed, or sold.

The SEC's Division of Enforcement previously announced preliminary settlements with Bank of America and RBC on Oct. 8, 2008. Today's finalized settlements with those two firms as well as Deutsche Bank provide nearly $6.7 billion to approximately 9,600 customers who invested in ARS before the market for those securities froze in February 2008.    » read more »

Levin, Grassley, Specter Release GAO Report on SEC Actions to Curb Stock Failures to Deliver and Manipulative Naked Short Selling

June 3, 2009 -- WASHINGTON – Today, Senator Carl Levin, D-Mich., Chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; Senator Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, Ranking Member of the Finance Committee; and Senator Arlen Specter, D-Penn., Chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs, released a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report analyzing recent actions taken by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to curb failures to deliver securities and manipulative naked short selling.    » read more »

JERSEY CITY, N.J., June 3, 2009 — Pershing LLC, a subsidiary of The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation, announced today that it has introduced NetX360™, an innovative and open-architecture technology platform for introducing broker-dealer firms, investment professionals, independent registered investment advisors (RIAs) and dually registered advisors.

This new offering provides Pershing's customers with a complete solution to help them effectively meet their clients' financial goals. It also enables them to efficiently manage their brokerage and advisory business on a single, integrated platform.    » read more »

June 2, 2009 -- New York -- Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) today announced that it has priced a public offering of approximately 80.2 million shares of common stock to the public at $27.44 per share for total gross proceeds of approximately $2.2 billion. The underwriter will have a 30-day option to purchase approximately up to an additional 4.0 million shares of common stock from Morgan Stanley.    » read more »

Up 17 Percent From April 2009

CHICAGO, June 2 -- CME Group, a derivatives exchange, today announced that May volume averaged 10.7 million contracts per day, down 15 percent from May 2008, but up 17 percent from April 2009. Total volume was 214 million contracts for May, of which 79 percent was traded electronically. Electronic volume averaged 8.4 million contracts per day, down 14 percent from the prior May and up 15 percent sequentially.    » read more »

NEW YORK, June 2, 2009 - J.P. Morgan was recently named "Best Overall Hedge Fund Administrator" by HFMWeek magazine in its 2009 Service Provider Awards. The awards recognize hedge fund service providers that outperformed their peer group in 2008/2009, and that demonstrated financial progress, growth and genuine innovation.

According to the Awards judges' statement: "A truly global administrator; J.P. Morgan was one of the few top credit-rated banks to take advantage of the flight to quality last year, offering the industry peace of mind at a time it needed it most."    » read more »

Washington, D.C., June 1, 2009 — The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced the Fair Fund distribution of more than $78 million to more than 590,000 investors who were affected by undisclosed market timing in certain AIM mutual funds.

The Fair Fund distribution stems from a prior SEC enforcement action against AIM Advisors, Inc., which advised the funds, and AIM Distributors, Inc. (ADI), which distributed the funds. In addition, this distribution includes money from two other Fair Funds, which are related to separate unlawful market timing enforcement actions that affected AIM investors.    » read more »