Howard Lutnick pitches the ‘Trump Card’

One scoop to start: Latham & Watkins is set to poach a star dealmaker from Wachtell Lipton as the Los Angeles-founded law firm, one of the world’s largest by revenue, seeks to build a corporate practice that can compete with its New York-based rivals.

A new Musk venture: X chief executive Linda Yaccarino has said that users will “soon” be able to make investments or trades on the social media platform, as she outlined a push into financial services in owner Elon Musk’s quest to build an “everything app”. 

And another thing: Risk advisory groups have seen a “sharp increase” in inquiries as companies in the Gulf ready contingency plans and activate crisis teams in preparation for any potential spillover of the Israel-Iran war.

In today’s newsletter: 

• Lutnick hawks the ‘Trump Card’

• TSB’s back on the market

• The journey from global scandal to IPO

The FT’s call with Howard Lutnick

Howard Lutnick called on Monday morning to pitch the “Trump Card”: a $5mn visa granting foreigners legal residency in the US.

The US commerce secretary told the FT he had privately urged foreign dignitaries on his Middle East trip to buy the visa.

Last week, he unveiled a website — trumpcard.gov — for people to signal their interest.

As the call with the FT’s Alex Rogers began on Monday, he claimed that 67,697 people had already signed up to the waiting list and ended the brief interview noting that the figure had jumped to 68,703.

Lutnick believes that the Trump Card — which he said would be made of gold — would rake in revenue for the US Treasury and attract global business leaders, and their high-skilled workers, to America. 

The commerce department, however, has not filled in the gaps. It planned to sell tens of thousands of visas this summer, according to people familiar with the matter, even though the programme at the moment is a landing page.

So far, the details are rather light. The fine print — like the parameters of a favourable tax structure and vetting requirements — haven’t been hashed out yet, or at least, haven’t been revealed publicly. 

Another question is how the card would impact the cheaper EB-5 foreign investor visa, which was established decades ago by Congress.

Of course, none of that’s stopping Lutnick, the ever-pugnacious banker and now Trump confidante who founded Cantor Fitzgerald. 

“Whenever I meet with international executives, I always go through it with them and sell it to them,” Lutnick told the FT. “I can’t help myself.”

Banks circle TSB

When BBVA made a hostile €11bn takeover bid for its rival Spanish lender Sabadell more than a year ago, it opened up the possibility that the Sabadell-owned UK bank TSB could end up back on the market.

This week, that possibility became more real when the FT’s Simon Foy and DD’s Ivan Levingston revealed that Sabadell was examining a sale of TSB after receiving unsolicited approaches.

With interested bidders expected to submit offers this month, the FT also reported on Wednesday that the UK’s NatWest had ruled out bidding for TSB, while Barclays and Santander were among those considering an offer.

TSB has traded hands a few times before. Founded as the Trustee Savings Bank in 1810, TSB had merged with Lloyds Banking Group in 1995 before it was ultimately carved out from the business as a result of a UK government bailout during the financial crisis.

TSB then floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2014, aiming to break the grip of the big UK high street banks on the retail market. 

It made a point of scrapping internal sales targets and offered customers higher interest rates “without the funny stuff”, before being bought by Sabadell in a £1.7bn deal less than a year later.

A deal for TSB would mark the latest in Europe’s banking sector, which has seen a flurry of transactions and attempted takeovers within the past year. 

Any potential new owner of TSB will be hoping for a smooth switch. 

When TSB transitioned from former owner Lloyds’ legacy infrastructure to Sabadell’s IT system in 2018, it left 2mn customers temporarily locked out of their accounts, costing the bank £49mn in fines.

Billionaire Batista brothers return

They built their family slaughterhouse into the world’s biggest meatpacker, only to fall into disgrace over a corruption scandal.

Now Brazil’s billionaire butcher barons are back.

The triumphant return of brothers Joesley and Wesley Batista was sealed last week when the company they control, JBS, finally listed its shares in New York, fulfilling a decade-long dream.

It capped a remarkable journey for the controversial tycoons, who expanded the meat processor through international acquisitions in the early years of the century to become a titan of the global food industry.

That achievement was in tatters less than a decade ago when they confessed to paying millions of dollars in bribes to politicians in their homeland. The two men spent time behind bars and almost toppled a president.

Following years in the wilderness, today the pair once again move among top politicians and businessmen in the South American nation. But the very public resurgence has sharpened scrutiny of the brothers.

The US listing proposal had to overcome an opposition campaign by a coalition of conservationists and cowboys. Activists have long accused JBS of fuelling deforestation in the Amazon. 

At the same time, opposition lawmakers in Brasília claim that an energy company within the Batista’s wider business empire received favourable treatment from the leftwing administration of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

The Batista family holding group, J&F Investimentos, strenuously denies the allegations, as does the government. 

Despite the likelihood that the Batistas will increase their voting power at JBS as a result of the New York listing, minority shareholders were ultimately enticed by the argument that it would boost the share price. 

“It’s important for them to be back in the game,” said one person who knows the brothers. “They live on it.”

Read the FT’s deep dive into the Batistas.

Job moves

• Blackstone has hired Laura Coady as the new global head of CLOs in London, Bloomberg reports. She previously worked at Jefferies.

• Trafigura’s head of strategic projects Julien Rolland is set to retire from the commodities trader, in the latest high-profile departure from the global group since Richard Holtum took over as chief executive.

• Akin Gump has hired M&A partner Joshua La Vigne and investment management partner Jessica Pan. They both previously worked at Mayer Brown.

Smart reads

Inner brawler Mark Zuckerberg has transformed into a red-blooded “Maga Mark”, FT Magazine writes, shocking liberals at Meta. But was he like this all along? 

Solar Armageddon Republicans have swiftly proposed dismantling renewable energy investments, the FT reports. The bankruptcies have already arrived.

Big Tech’s divide Artificial general intelligence has been tipped as the next big breakthrough out of Silicon Valley, the FT writes. But is it a scientific goal — or a marketing buzzword?

News round-up

France to double stake in Eutelsat as Europe looks for rival to Elon Musk’s Starlink (FT)

Ex-Janus Henderson analyst guilty of insider dealing as he worked from home (FT)

UK rebuffs Thames Water creditor demands as administration looms (FT)

Lockheed Martin approaches UK government with air defence pitch (FT)

Wall Street leans on stock traders to cushion dealmaking slowdown (FT)