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Media: Goldman ‘friends’ Facebook

In a deal that could double the estimated $6.9 billion personal fortune of chief executive Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook secured $450 million in funding from Goldman Sachs, plus another $50 million from a Russian investor, said Andrew Ross Sorkin and Evelyn Rusli in NYTimes.com. The investment “signals the increasing might of Facebook” and gives the social-networking site “more firepower” to develop new products and make key acquisitions without having to go public. Insiders say the deal values Facebook at $50 billion—more than eBay, Yahoo, or Time Warner.

Actually, this infusion of cash only “heightens the likelihood that Facebook will go public, probably in 2012,” said Sam Gustin in Wired.com. By fronting the money to Facebook, Goldman is essentially securing the rights to take the company public eventually. “It’s a predictably savvy investment by Goldman.” Zuckerberg, a 26-year-old Harvard dropout, has been “cool to the notion” of a public offering, but “he knows as well as anyone” that an IPO is in the cards. In the meantime, the Goldman deal will make it easier for early Facebook investors and employees to sell their shares. Indeed, some early investors are likely eyeing a “handsome exit.”

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Pay-to-play: Rattner settles

Last week marked the end of “an embarrassing episode” for financier and former U.S. car czar Steven Rattner, said David Shepardson in The Detroit News. Just one day before Andrew Cuomo left his job as New York attorney general to be sworn in as governor, Rattner agreed to pay $10 million to settle lawsuits accusing him of paying intermediaries to secure business from New York State pension funds. In November, Rattner, who has admitted no wrongdoing, said he would pay $6.2 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission to end its investigation into Rattner’s involvement in New York’s “pay-to-play” scandal.

Books: Borders falls behind on bills

In an “ominous turn of events,” Borders Group said it would delay payments to some book publishers as it looks to refinance its debt, said Jeffrey Trachtenberg in The Wall Street Journal. The nation’s second-largest book retailer has seen Internet retailers and digital-book sales sapping its business. Key shareholder William Ackman said Borders should buy rival Barnes & Noble for $960 million. Even if that lowball offer were accepted, however, it would “likely face antitrust scrutiny.”

Health care: CVS banks on Medicare D

Hoping to piggyback on the growth of Medicare and the aging boomer population, drugstore behemoth CVS Caremark agreed to buy Universal American’s Medicare Part D unit for about $1.25 billion, said Brian Pacampara in The Motley Fool. “As part of the deal, CVS will acquire all of Universal American’s outstanding stock and then distribute 100 percent of a newly formed public company—which will have about $640 million of cash and no debt—to the company’s shareholders.” Universal American shares soared 38 percent on the news.

WikiLeaks: BofA braces for trouble

When WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said in late November that he planned to “take down” a major American bank, Bank of America went into overdrive, said Nelson Schwartz in The New York Times. Assange had previously said his team possessed a hard drive with five gigabytes of data from a Bank of America executive. Top bank officials are now “scouring thousands of documents” and preparing crisis communication strategies to prepare for an anticipated data dump.