The News: One Thing They're Not Fighting Over - Derivatives Reform

Democrats will spend much of today trying to get their financial reform bill on to the floor, though it's not clear if they've got the 60 votes they need to do it. But if they fail today, they'll succeed eventually - probably some time this week - since Republicans aren't all on fire to be the ones standing in the way of reform.

Whatever happens, some kind of change is almost certainly in store for derivatives trading. The Washington Post says the bill will include language to:

...dramatically reshape several critical markets and deprive large financial firms of a major source of revenue. The source said a controversial provision to ban big Wall Street banks from trading in derivatives would remain, despite initial objections from administration officials.

Democrats view the effort to bring transparency and accountability to the $600 trillion derivatives market as an area in which they might gain Republican votes for the overall legislation.

Stay Tuned.

Deal May Force Trading-Desk Spinoff [WSJ]

Financial bill in limbo going into key vote [Washington Post]

Goldman's Take-No-Prisoners Attitude [WSJ]

Guest Post: Quote From Colonel L. Blankfein Jessup Before a Commission ofInquiry [Stone Street Advisors]

Stifel To Acquire Thomas Weisel for $300M [TheStreet.com]

How the Ratings Agencies Lost the Will to Say 'No' [Daily Finance]

Royal Bank of Scotland clamps down on CEO's performance-based bonus structure [The Australian]

Broker-Dealers revenue down 10% [InvestmentNews]

C.D.O. Days, S&M Nights at Derivatives Conference [NY Times]