The Seattle Times reports the sad case of Raj Godhania, a former technology systems professional at Merrill Lynch, who was laid-off in January.

According to the newspaper, Godhania, 45, sold his house in London, gave away his dog and moved his family to the US (he has a wife and two young children) in 2006 following a promotion. The IT professional claims that his 9-week severance is running out, and that his visa is now void as he has no job. He says that Merrill has refused to pay the family's $10,000 moving expenses (to get them back to the UK) and has provided no contribution for the airfare required to get them home. Mrs Godhania is quoted, saying: 'Merrill Lynch left us on the streets. I'm just so angry and scared. What the hell is going to happen to us'.

The Sunday Telegraph reports that the sale of iShares (Barclays' ETF business) has given rise to speculation that the bank will now listen to offers for the remainder of its Barclays Global Investors unit. iShares was sold to hedge fund CVC Partners in a $4.4bn deal last week.

The Times reports that Karam Butalia, the former global head of private equity at Standard Chartered, received a $23.4m pay packet last year, making him the highest-paid employee at a UK bank. The newspaper looks to have forgotten Barclays' Roger Jenkins, the man who heads up the bank's Private Equity and Principal Investments business. Although Jenkins will probably not get the $110m is is thought to have bagged a couple of years back, he is thought likely to have comfortably bested Butalia's $23m in 2008.

The Financial Times reports that Nomura is moving several key management and strategic business roles to London, as it continues to believe that the City will remain Europe's pre-eminent financial centre. The newspaper quotes Hiromi Yamaji, the CEO of Nomura International, who said: 'If you stay in Japan, you just focus on Japn. You become immersed in the Japanese perspective. That is easy because you can communicate in Japanese, but, if you do that too much, you lose global perspective'.

And The Wall Street Journal reports that Goldman Sachs is putting together a $5.5bn limited partnership in order to acquire private-equity investments at a discount on the secondary market.

Finally, the newspaper also reports that HSBC is looking to raise around $4bn by the sale and lease back of three major properties - its Canary Wharf (London) HQ, and offices in Paris and New York.

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