News has emerged from China that online finance company Ezubao, a purported peer-to-peer lender, was running a Ponzi scheme that “bilked investors out of more than $7.6 billion, spent lavishly on gifts and salaries and buried the evidence” – NYTimes and Law360 and WSJ

Don’t expect yesterday’s announced Barclays/Credit Suisse settlement to be the end of regulators’ dark pool investigations, especially as their popularity continues to grow thanks to HFT advances – NYTimes and Bloomberg

Some chicken and egg treatment for the economy and the stock market, courtesy of MoneyBeat – WSJ

Abbott—in whom, in the interest of full disclosure, I don’t invest but might as well given the amount of money I’ve spent on their Similac baby formula in the last 4 years—announced yesterday that it’s agreed to acquire diagnostics company Alere for an expected $5.8 billion – NYTimes

Carl Icahn’s not happy with AIG and is threatening to propose a slate of possible board members next week, but the insurance giant is moving ahead with its “streamlining” (as opposed to splitting) plans anyway – NYTimes

Meanwhile, some former  JPMers at Hudson Executive Capital have CIT in their sights, just as John Thain is heading out the door – WSJ

BlackRock co-founder and CEO Laurence Fink’s going out on a limb by suggesting that “quarterly earnings hysteria” should be de-emphasized in favor of a much-needed  “long-term approach.” But will anyone go along with him? – NYTimes

Maybe not the folks at Alphabet, who must be pretty pleased with their first official earnings report that has helped vault the Google parent company into the #1 spot as the world’s most valuable company – WSJ

Here’s an alternative view on junk bonds—outside of commodities, things are looking pretty rosy – Bloomberg

Basketball’s not my sport of choice, but I’m very happy to call myself a Golden State fan on the PBJ front – WSJ