Revealed as the owner of a 40th-floor apartment at 15 CPW.

The Observer has spent many an afternoon trying to puzzle out the clues in mysterious LLCs. That is, the LLCs that have clues—those that were not registered in Delaware approximately a month before the real estate purchase they were created to shield, named after the building that they are buying property in, and/or in the care of a huge midtown law firm.

But as real estate chronicler Michael Gross proves in a new Newsweek article, promising clues may well be red herrings. When Novgorod LLC purchased a nine-room spread on the 40th floor of 15 Central Park West in 2009, it was assumed that the buyer was one of the many rich Russians who had been sniffing around the building. Quite possibly a rich Russian with some intense personal or professional connection to the city in whose name he'd purchased a $37 million dollar condo.

Mr. Gross, who is finishing up a book on 15 CPW, reveals that the buyer wasn't a rich Russian at all, but rather an American: Bob Diamond, the Connecticut-born CEO of British bank Barclays. In 2009, Mr. Diamond had yet to be raked over the coals for his role in the Libor interest rate scandal (for which he would lose his job, though not his fortune), but he was being pilloried in the press for his excessive pay.

Not hard to see why Mr. Diamond would want to hide the fact that he was buying an extravagant spread at New York's most luxurious condo in the midst of the global financial crisis.

But as Mr. Gross notes, it is the fallout of this financial crisis that has made New York an even more attractive place for the world's wealthiest citizens to park their money. With much of that money belonging to the foreign elite, some of whom made their fortunes via less-than-honorable means, the luxury condo towers have started to displace the so-called "good" buildings lining the Gold Coast at the top of the city's real estate hierarchy. Chief among them (at least for now) is One57. As Gross writes, "its will-to-power penthouses are so high in the sky, they also promise invulnerability to the flight-capital types now pouring into New York to protect fortunes made on the lawless frontiers of emerging markets."

Indeed, while Mr. Diamond and a handful of other buyers at 15 CPW have managed to obscure their identities behind LLCs, the building's level of secrecy is nothing compared to One57, where hardly anyone knows anything about any of the buyers, except that they're fabulously wealthy. And that they probably wouldn't do very well in a co-op board interview.

kvelsey@observer.com

The wheels on the bus go round and round.

The Atlantic Yards certainly knows how to get someone else to pick up the tab. It's like a friend who always manages to forget his wallet when going out to dinner, or the pal who neglects to pony up her share of the group gift you all went in on together.

First, the project scored $305 million in state and city subsidies via the Empire State Development Corporation, then the arena protested a tax assessment for taxes it didn't even have to pay (an oversight, it claimed), and now it's literally getting a free ride on the existing transportation infrastructure—an infrastructure that is ferrying a lot of visitors and cash to Barclays, but that Ratner doesn't want to help finance.

Making Barclays and future developments pay their share for increased transportation needs is among the recommendations of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign's latest report "Brooklyn gateway transportation vision. " As Capital New York notes, the report is basically a wish list of policy changes and funding proposals for a borough with a rapidly growing population. A rapidly growing population that is putting an increasing amount strain on aging transportation infrastructure will, inevitably, require more and more repairs and overhauls as time goes by.

So what is main problem with implementing the transportation vision? Money. The problem is always money. Which is where innovations like congestion pricing and residential parking permits might come in handy. Or getting the developer of a huge, money-hauling arena that is putting a significant strain on the local transportation infrastructure to help shoulder the costs.

Among the report's other suggestions (you can read the entire report here) is that Forest City Ratner pay for the subway fares for Barclays Center patrons, like it promised to. And fund a New Jersey to Fulton Ferry ferry service.

We won't hold our breath for those initiatives (we're still waiting on the housing), but maybe some of the other recommendations will actually materialize, like more secure bike parking at Barclays Center or a transit impact fee that developments will be required to pay in support of mass transit.
kvelsey@observer.com

The yards as they once were.

The battle over the Atlantic Yards has been a punishing experience even for the most dedicated community activist. It has been long and unrewarding and now, with the opening of the arena, many are finally calling it quits, The New York Times reports.

Losing the fight over eminent domain was the first straw and after years of sifting through documents, plans and financial filings, many saw Jay-Z's first concert there as the last straw. The arena is a fait accompli and while the huge housing towers that helped Forest City Ratner secure so much government funding have yet to materialize, nitpicking the plans for the next half-decade is not something a lot of the opponents can stomach.

Nor do they want to.

“I never realized how angry I was during those years,” musician Scott M.X. Turner told The Times. “Now my life is not being angry all the time.”

People neglected careers, friends and families to devote 20 or more hours to the battle against Barclays. Opposing the project became an all-consuming passion for many and one that they no longer want to devote themselves to.

Candance Carponter, the real estate lawyer behind Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, admitted to exhaustion, but said that she was proud for fighting for what she believed in, even if she hadn't won the fight.

Many who plan to, or have already thrown in the towel, have also moved on physically, taking up residence in new neighborhoods or states. Others, particularly those who must live with the new arena, vow to continue.

“The fight isn’t over,” graphic designer Jon Crow, who is involved with a nearby community garden, told The Times. “We’ve got a neighborhood to protect.”

kvelsey@observer.com

The numbers, which have been closely followed in political circles, showed unemployment rising to 7.9 percent from 7.8 percent last month, hitting the average estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. In a separate Bloomberg survey, economists estimated the U.S. would gain 125,000 jobs after adding 114,000 jobs last month.

While the jobs report has been overshadowed in recent days by the storm that rocked the East Coast, halting U.S. markets for two days and raising the specter of a delayed report, job stats have been a focal point amid a presidential campaign that has often focused on the slow pace of recovery in the U.S. economy.

Last month, after the unemployment rate dipped below 8 percent for the first time since 2009, former General Electric CEO Jack Welch questioned the validity of the numbers on Twitter, implying that the numbers had been doctored by the federal government to aid President Obama's re-election campaign.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics revised the non-farm payroll jobs gained in September upward to 148,000, from 114,000, and said that Hurricane Sandy didn't have a material affect on this month's report.

Mr. Welch has yet to tweet on the October job numbers.

Elsewhere on Wall Street:

Royal Bank of Scotland said it would probably face fines over charges it manipulated inter-bank lending rates such as Libor.

The eight "systemically important" U.S. banks: Bank of America, Bank of New York Mellon, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, State Street and Wells Fargo.

America's midsize banks, including U.S. Bancorp and PNC Financial, are opening their own lobbying shops, according to Bloomberg, in a nod to their differing imperatives from larger Wall Street banks.

Rhode Island is suing Barclays, Wells Fargo and former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling over inadequate disclosures pertaining to a $75 million loan the state facilitated for Mr. Schilling's video game company, 38 Studios.

"What can we make of this Barclays FERC thing? Besides, like, ha ha ha Barclays you sure like manipulating things?"

Market Folly has notes on David Einhorn's Iron Ore short idea.

The Times’sPeter Lattman on the Bruce-Bharara Bromance: "Before ripping into “Death to My Hometown,” a rollicking Celtic-inspired anthem, Mr. Springsteen shouted, “This is for Preet Bharara!” (Mr. Springsteen name-checks Mr. Bharara a YouTube clip about 22 seconds in.)"

The market maker, which had been running on backup generators since Sandy landed on Monday evening, is said to have lost power around 11:45 a.m. yesterday. According to a memo obtained by The Times, the firm told clients that "all computer interfaces with Knight will be shutdown with no new orders, both by phone or electronic, being accepted at this time."

It's been a hard year for Knight. The firm was one of the market makers to lose millions to technical difficulties at Nasdaq during Facebook's initial public offering, then required rescue from outside investors after losing $440 million due to a technical glitch in its own trading program.

Citadel Group and Goldman Sachs were among the firms to take increased trading volumes during Knight's outage, according to Bloomberg.

Other new from around Wall Street:

Morgan Stanley's office building at 1 New York Plaza, and AIG's headquarters at 180 Maiden Lane, will be closed for weeks as building managers deal with flooding after the storm, according to Bloomberg.

Activist investor Carl Icahn disclosed a 10 percent stake in Netflix in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday. “The reporting persons believe Netflix may hold significant strategic value for a variety of significantly larger companies that are engaging in more direct competition with one another due to the evolution of the Internet, mobile, and traditional industry,” Mr. Icahn said in the filing, according to The Times.

A British man charged with involvement in an insider trading scheme that stretched from New York to Central Asia told an informant he got privileged information from a former director of the New York Stock Exchange, reports Bloomberg.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission said it was seeking $435 million in civil penalties from Barclays for alleged energy market manipulation in the Western U.S. between 2006 and 2008. Barclays, which agreed to a $450 million settlement this summer over Libor-rigging charges, is also facing a Justice Department anti-corruption investigation over the firm's efforts to raise money in the Middle East in the early days of the financial crisis, The Journal reports.

JPMorgan is suing Javier Martin-Artajo, the trading manager who supervised the gamble on credit derivatives that led to the bank's $6 billion London Whale loss, in London Court.

As bonus season nears, nearly half of Wall Street employees expect high bonuses this year, according to an eFinancialServices.com survey cited by Bloomberg.

Since the Center for Responsive Politics started tracking campaign donations in 1989, Goldman Sachs has give more money to Democratic politicians than has any other corporation, according to The Journal. This year, the firm has reversed its 2008 support for President Barack Obama, and is raising money for Mitt Romney.

When les riches said they'd pay higher taxes for the good of France, they didn't mean this high, writes Andrew Ross Sorkin.

Three years ago, 80 percent of Spain's foreclosures were on immigrant homeowners. Today, businesspeople, upper-middle class families and guarantors (often the parents of first-time buyers) make up 60 percent of foreclosures.

Barclays said it would buy the Buy the mortgages and deposits of ING Direct U.K., the British unit of the Dutch lender.

Private equity firms including Sun Capital Partners and Cerberus Capital agreed to pay $166 million to settle a suit over the leveraged buy-out of now-defunct retailer Mervyn's, The New York Post reports.

Goldman Sachs will pay $6.75 million to settle charges it mislabeled options orders to get better rates from various exchanges.

Richard J. Davis, a former Weil Gotschal partner, has been names the bankruptcy trustee for Fletcher International, according to The New York Post. The hedge fund, run by Alphonse "Buddy" Fletcher, is locked in a dispute with three Louisiana public pension funds.

Phil Anschutz is seeking $10 billion for Anschutz Entertainment Group, his sports and entertainment empire, according to Reuters.

The Swiss bank Julius Baer may cut 1,000 jobs after its acquisition of Merrill Lynch's non-U.S. wealth management units from Bank of America, according to Bloomberg.

Somewhere, an algorithm read the coverage of yesterday's Senate Banking Committee hearing on high-frequency trading, and figured it will take years for the government to hammer out reforms to fix market structure issues.

Stephen Morse, the Barclays executive who ignored employees' warnings that the bank was manipulating its Libor submissions, has been sitting out the ensuing scandal from his post as head of compliance at TD Bank.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission said it may suspend JPMorgan's energy trading business for failing to comply with requests for information about the firm's trading profits, Bloomberg reports.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is scrutinizing whether private equity firms are taking more profits than they should, or taking profits too soon. The agency received increased authority over private money managers under Dodd-Frank.

The federal government's mortgage task force, co-headed by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, is getting ready to do ... something?

More than 100 lawmakers have lobbied federal authorities on the implementation of Dodd-Frank, according to The New York Times.

Madoff trustee Irving Picard put checks in the mail yesterday—$2.5 billion in payments to thousands of investors duped by the Ponzi schemer.

Does anyone want to bail out Greece (again)?

Youth unemployment is also on the rise in prosperous northern Europe.

A Brazilian official said that the Federal Reserve's new bond-buying program would set off currency wars—Business Insider explains.

Nomura is eliminating four of 12 investment banking jobs in Dubai, according to Bloomberg, on the heels of the decision to dump a London-based prop trading team.

Britain is considering whether it really wants to be known as the "divorce capital of the world." That means, the Ministry of Justice is reviewing court standards that favor the less-wealthy spouse in split-ups.

Are you reading this from Jeffrey Gundlach's Porsche Carrera 4S? Would you like to make a deal?

First went Bob Diamond, who snapped up Lehman's U.S. securities business for Barclays, and who stepped down at the beginning of July after his bank agreed to pay $450 million to settle an investigation into its efforts to manipulate interbank lending rates.

Next fell Nomura chief executive Kenichi Watanabe and chief operating officer Takumi Shibata—who led Nomura's deal for Lehman's European and Asian units—amid an insider trading scandal that roiled the Japanese firm.

This week, it seemed, Barclays and Nomura appeared to pare back their respective global ambitions in tandem. Barclays was first again, naming retail banking chief Antony Jenkins to replace Mr. Diamond as chief executive; Mr. Jenkins told Bloomberg that he was"very confident" about the investment bank, and has previously spoken in favor of the universal banking model. Nontheless, Mr. Jenkins becomes the only CEO of a global, universal bank without an investment banking background, raising speculation that Barclays would back away from Mr. Diamond's quest to build a premier investment bank—a quest defined in part by the Lehman acquisition.

Nomura followed suit today, announcing $1 billion in cost cuts in its wholesale unit in a move that marked a retreat from the play for increased global importance hinged on Mr. Fuld's sloppy seconds. Like Mr. Jenkins, new Nomura CEO Koji Nagai has a background that would suggest a more humble strategy: According to The Times, Mr. Nagai "spent most of his career focused on Nomura’s domestic operations"; last month, Mr. Nagai said he plans to reduce the firm's footprint “to an appropriate size.”

(Carolyn Kaster/AP)

JPMorgan's internal investigation into trading losses associated with the trader known as the London Whale is far from over, and has required the efforts of more than 100 hundred lawyers, Reuters reports. U.S. authorities have also begun interviewing witnesses, and a high-quality internal probe may be helpful in dealing with the government.

As Knight Capital was reeling in the aftermath of a $440 million trading loss, JPMorgan refused to accept thousands of securities Knight hoped to use to obtain financing to stay afloat, The Wall Street Journal reports. JPMorgan's hesitance came amid a review of the banks dealings with brokerages that use JPMorgan to clear trades.

The Journal gathered economists' expectations for Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's speech in Jackson Hole.

Rumor is that Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, a strident critic of proposed intervention by the European Central Bank in sovereign debt markets, may resign.

Nomura will take $1 billion of costs out of its wholesale unit, which includes investment banking and trading operations, according to Bloomberg.

Spain is considering pumping its own money into Bankia SA, the failed lender thought to be headed for a European bailout, in a move that would protect junior creditors, Bloomberg reports. Does Spain have enough cash?

Greece announced plans to slash public sector wages, pensions and social spending to find the savings needed to satisfy European rescuers.

The unemployment rate in the eurozone rose to a record 11.3 percent in July.

Nobody knows anything about investing, according to an SEC study on financial literacy, and so leave the stock-picking to the experts, writes Kevin Roose.

Citigroup agreed to pay $590 million to settle a class-action lawsuit with shareholders who said the bank misled them regarding its exposure to subprime mortgage debt. The plaintiffs said Citi used improper accounting practices to conceal the size of its faltering portfolio in credit default swaps. In a statement, Citi denied the allegations and insisted, of course, that it is "fundamentally a different company today than at the beginning of the financial crisis."

Louis Freeh, trustee for MF Global's holding company, called for a global settlement that would end his feud with James Giddens, the trustee for MF Global's brokerage company, according to The New York Times.

Chinese banks appear to be among the coterie of global lenders to have flouted U.S. sanctions against Iran, The New York Times reports.

Shares in Yelp jumped yesterday in what The Wall Street Journal is confident in labeling a short squeeze.

The Journal sees Wall Street regulators throwing "sharp elbows" at each other in the competition for big cases and big headlines.

Latvia is a "Swiss-style" banking center for ex-Soviet cash, according to Bloomberg.

France's prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault says the 75 percent tax against high wage earners would be part of a collective national recovery effort. Business leaders said...the tax would hurt business.

German chancellor Angela Merkel said that Europe had an "absolute political will" to stabilize the euro. Italy's successful bond offering today indicates that investors believe the European Central Bank will intervene in sovereign debt markets.