Bloomberg is reporting that Bob McCann, the former head of Merrill Lynch’s brokerage unit, is nearing a deal with his old employer that will allow him to take a job running UBS’s wealth management unit. Yes, this rumor has been going on for some weeks now. McCann was a much beloved Merrill man, though some Merrill reps we know were not enthused that he bluntly told them that he was not a broker advocate but, instead, was working for shareholders. more

McCann to UBS? Bloomberg reports that it’s happening. http://bit.ly/1922E4

Oy. Today Madoff’s former lover thought she’d make back some of her life savings which she lost to Madoff by publishing a tell-all book about her affair with the swindler. Here is an excerpt from the Daily Beast:

“After five years of lunch-hour flirting, which escalated into dinners and more, Weinstein persuaded Bernie to handle her family’s personal savings. Their financial arrangement was sealed with a memorable kiss, followed by six months of prolonged cuddling and yet more kissing.”

Gov-program skeptic Niall Ferguson v. “we’re-all-socialists-now” Krugman. The y are pounding each other in print. http://bit.ly/asdvQ

Fifteen states will hold sales tax holidays this year, says the Tax Foundation. While retail sales do go up during the holiday, the Tax Foundation says that retail sales for the year do not. Consumers don’t spend more; they just time their purchases. So, no, sales tax holidays don’t “pay for themselves,” as politicians argue. In short, tax holidays are gimmicks used by politicians to favor certain industries and products, which has the effect of introducing “costly economic distortions into the economy,” says Micah Cohen, a summer fellow at the Tax Foundation. Instead, Cohen writes, “Tax policy should be neutral to economic decision-making.”

By the way, the Tax Foundation, based Washington, D.C., is a nonpartisan research and educational organization that has monitored fiscal policy at the federal, state and local levels since 1937. The foundation is worth watching.

Who can say he predicted the surge in prices for sugar, up 88 percent this year? But then that would have been a tough call, since the sugar price surge has been caused by a sever draught in India, which accounts for about 15 percent of the world’s sugar production. The legendary Jim Rogers says the tasty commodity has room to run.

Government officials and investors of all kinds over different epochs have hated short sellers. Peter Lynch, the great Fido fund manager, likened it to “borrowing with criminal intent.” Napoleon called citizens who were shorting French government securities were committing treason. And so it goes . . .

Yesterday, the SEC said it wants to make it harder for investors to sell stocks short. more

A former financial advisor sues Citigroup, arguing that he shouldn’t have to pay back his signing bonus all at once. http://bit.ly/ngKwb

Bet you didn’t know that there is a provision in the tax code that allows Ponzi victims to deduct (called the theft loss deduction) 95 percent of their net investment losses the year the theft is discovered. See AccountingWeb.com.

RT @Fiduciary360: fi360’s Fausti looks at how the #fiduciary standard would affect b/ds in RegisteredRep magazine: http://bit.ly/Uizhp