Briac

* Jeremy Grantham: The last hurrah and seven lean years. * peHUB readers will play softball at Fenway Park this afternoon, for the Field of Dreams event. You're going down, TD BankNorth... * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London drops early, European shares retreat, the Nikkei keeps rising (despite Toyota) and Hong Kong stumbles. * Nicholas Carson: Should Google spin out YouTube? * The Economist: Why do people turn subprime? * Quote of the Day I comes from Owen Thomas, who is leaving Valleywag to join NBC Bay Area: "I will say that people in Silicon Valley really do want to change the world, but they want to change the world from one in which they’re poor to one in which they’re rich."

* Don't blame short-sighted automakers, over-privileged unions or Japan for Detroit's woes. Blame chicken farmers. * Floyd Norris: The Internet's role in gaming the markets. * Morning Call: U.S. shares point upward as we await the April jobs data, London rises early, European stocks climb on financial and commodities, the Nikkei hits 6-month closing high on bank surge and Hong Kong edges up 1 percent. * HCA has un-PIKed its PIK toggle. Is this a sign that the leveraged loan bubble may not be the next economic shoe to drop? * Luxury as an investment? That's the tact being taken by some high-end marketers. * BusinessWeek puts private equity back on its cover (after a long hiatus), suggesting that the industry could ultimately "rev up" the U.S. economy. I've got a bunch if little nit-picks (e.g., CalPERS raising its PE allocation, which was more a denominator effect response than faith in the asset class), but my big criticism is that the authors don't discuss the repercussions from the lousy mega-deals done in 2005-2008. Not only from an ROI perspective, but from a time-consumption and reputational perspective. It's a Schwarzmanian outlook, in which the future is unencumbered by the past. (all that aside, still a very worthy read)

What follows are six VC deals culled from recent Regulation D filings with the SEC. They have not been otherwise disclosed: Enphase Energy Inc., a Petaluma, Calif.-based developer of micro-inverter systems for the solar industry, has raised $22.57 million in new VC funding, according to a regulatory filing. No investor info was disclosed, but the company's website identifies three investors: Appplied Ventures, Rockport Capital Partners and Third Point Management. www.enphaseenergy.com Tokai Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Cambridge, Mass.-based maker of drugs that focus on focus on endocrine treatment, has secured $10 million

* Tim Geithner: How we tested the big banks. * More importantly, has KFC failed the Oprah stress test? * A123 founder Yet-Ming Chiang has a new startup, in partnership with MIT prof Michael Cima. Biotech this time, rather than energy. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London up early, European stocks boosted by financials, the Nikkei keeps climbing and Hong Kong shares rise again. * The anonymous Chrysler holdouts are anonymous no more. * A new GAO report criticizes the SEC under Chris Cox. * Club Penguin sold to Disney in 2007 for $350 million in cash, plus another $350 million in potential earn-outs. The company's founders are still waiting on that second part.

* Bank of America apparently will require a $34 billion capital infusion. So much for private investors stepping in to save the day (let alone Ken Lewis' job)... * The Weather Channel's new owners have had a heck of a time finding a new CEO. It was looking like ex-CNBC boss Bill Bolster was the man, but negotiations have stalled over Bolster's demand for a private jet. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London holds steady, European shares keep rising, the Nikkei climbs 1.7% and Hong Kong closes at a 7-month high. * RBS has decided it no longer needs a global head of financial sponsors. This comes, of course, one day after Madison Dearborn decided it no longer needs a CFO. * The Q1 slowdown in U.S. venture capital deals was mirrored globally. * Felix Salmon: Why asset managers should ignore credit ratings. * Marshall Kirkpatrick: Firefox could be the real Facebook challenger.

* Barry Ritholtz: How will the Chrysler bankruptcy -- and the Obama response -- affect insolvent banks? * More bad news for Aldus Equity, which now runs the risk of becoming this scandal's Triumph Capital. Connecticut terminated its relationship yesterday, and the Los Angeles Fire & Police Pensions will vote on a similar move this Thursday. * Nogales Investors has finally bought Numero Uno Market, three years after first signing its letter of intent. In the interim were 55 felony counts and a possible life sentence. * Morning Call: U.S. futures mixed, London rises early, European shares hit 16-week high, the Nikkei keeps climbing and Hong Kong edges upward. * Stress test results: Ten of the nation's 19 largest banks will be told to raise more capital. * TPG Capital sounds like it's taking a page from Apollo Management's playbook, by telling investors that it's not really a leveraged buyout firm. * The private equity industry, aided by secondary firms, raised around $30 billion in new fund capital last month.

* Katie Benner: The silver lining for Cerberus is that it can now fold Chrysler Financial into GMAC. * John Carney: The White House "directly threatened" Perella Weinberg over Chrysler. The White House says it did no such thing. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, European shares rise, the Nikkei hits a four-month closing high and Hong Kong does 12 weeks better. * Limited partner to venture capitalists: Won't some of you please go away? * Peter Bergman: Why small companies will win in this economy. * Swine flu hits the World of Warcraft. * Sara Lacy: Why OpenTable matters (from an IPO perspective, not from a restaurant reservation perspective).

* In the wake of Chrysler, The Deal looks back at other PE-backed disasters. In related news, Bob Nardelli is holding his head high. * Izabella Kaminska: It's not a liquidity crisis, it's an energy crisis. * I'm at the Nantucket Conference today, and this afternoon will be moderating a VC panel with Brad Feld of Foundry Group, Josh Kopelman of First Round, Jo Tango of Kepha and (maybe) Michael Greeley of Flybridge. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London flattens out, the Nikkei hits a four-month closing high and Hong Kong shares jump 3.8 percent. * Felix Salmon: When bloggers uncover Ponzi schemes * Facebook's chief privacy officer is considering a run for California AG. Here's his Facebook page, which is filling up with supporters.

* Tech M&A: Going down, down, down. * Video from Milken Conference, of institutional investors taking their shots at PE and hedge fund managers. * Jeff Cox: Dow at 10,000 by year's end? Some pros think it's possible. Oh, and Sumner Redstone seems to be one of those shiny happy people. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London jumps early, European shares move into the black for 2009, the Nikkei climbs 3.9% and Hong Kong rounds out the positive news. * Heidi Moore: The new SEC is like an old investment bank. * The NY Post picks up the ball on Facebook holding financing talks with private equity firms like General Atlantic (a story originally reported by TechCrunch). It also says that Facebook's current investors aren't thrilled with the dilution that such a deal could require. What the Post doesn't mention, however, is that those current investors probably don't really have much say. Unlike almost every other venture-backed company in history, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg has the power to accept or veto a sale of the company -- and I'd assume this power also extends to okaying or denying new financing rounds. It was a structure set up in

* Gordon Gekko returns. That is not a metaphor. * Charlie Gasparino: Ken Lewis vs. John Thain has devestated the credibility of both men. * Morning Call: U.S. futures looking up, London rises early, European shares bolstered by earnings news, the Nikkei falls on financial system fears and Hong Kong shares climb 2.8 percent. * NY Times: "The Obama administration is prepared to force Chrysler into bankruptcy by the end of the week unless it gets unanimous consent from a group of banks and hedge funds to retire the automaker’s debt." * Vinod Khosla talks renewable energy at the Milken Conference (video). * Major shareholders of both Shinsei Bank and Aozora bank reportedly oppose a merger. The article isn't explicit, but I'd assume that means both Cerberus and JC Flowers are saying "no."