China has taken its first major step into the U.S. car market as General Motors announced it had finalized a deal to sell off its Hummer truck brand to Chinese auto manufacturer Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery.

Under the deal, GM will continue to make the trucks no later than 2010. While a deal has been reached, it is still going to be up to Chinese regulators to approve the deal and decide if the brand can be profitable and fit into the country's overall national strategy to improve energy efficiency.

General Electric Co. (NYSE GE), owner of the 83 year old peacock NBC, wants to sell part of it to Comcast Corp. (NYSE: CCT), according to Alisa Roth, who reports that GE has entered into negotiations with Comcast to do just that.

Comcast is already the biggest cable operator in the country. If the deal goes through Comcast would own NBS, Bravo, CNBC and MSNBC, and other channels.

Some big acquisition news in the oilfield service industry today, as Baker Hughes (NYSE: BHI) announced that it would be buying BJ Services (NYSE: BJS).

The deal is for cash and stock, and is reportedly valued at $5.5 billion.

According to the details that have been released, BJS stockholders will be getting 0.40035 shares of BHI stock in addition to $2.69 in cash.

In a move to bring profitability to its popular video sharing site YouTube, Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) has inked a deal with Time Warner, Inc. (NYSE: TWX) to show clips of the company's television shows and movies.

When Google announced back in 2006 that it would be paying $1.65 billion for the popular video sharing site, a lot of critics questioned whether or not the company would be able to turn a profit from the site, which at the time had around 46% of the online video market share.

Just as foreclosures account for a record share of the real estate market, foreclosed companies are also one of the few areas of activity in the private equity space.

Sun Capital Partners took Stila Cosmetics private back in 2006, but defaulted on loans from Wachovia and CIT Group (NYSE: CIT) -- leading those lenders to foreclose on the company.

Now Stila has been sold to New York private equity firm Patriarch Partners for an undisclosed sum sure to be considerably lower than what Sun Capital paid when it bought the brand from Estee Lauder (NYSE: EL), which originally purchased the company from founder Jeanine Lobell back in 1999.

Over the years, IT outsourcing Satyam (NYSE: SAY) became a symbol of the innovation and growth of India. Unfortunately, with the uncovering of the billion-dollar accounting scandal, the name is now in tatters.

However, Satyam has done an impressive job in taking action to deal with the crisis. For example, the company brought in A.S. Murthy as the CEO -- a 15-year veteran of Satyam -- who has lots of credibility. At the same time, the company has also appointed Homi Khusrokhan, the former Managing Director of Tata Chemicals, and Partho Datta, the former Finance Director of the Murugappa Group as special advisors. Boston Consulting Group will also provide much-needed assistance-for free.

Reuters reports that Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) will sell between 10% and 20% of its equity to Mitsubishi UFJ -- Japan's largest bank. It is not sure how much it will buy because it has not yet conducted due diligence. "MUFG said it would decide on the amount it would pay after carrying out due diligence," according to Reuters.

This -- combined with the announcement this morning that Morgan Stanley would change into a Bank Holding Company (BHC) -- increases the odds that it will remain independent. But its survival depends on raising more capital. In order to boost its ratio of assets to equity from 30.3:1 to 11:1 to meet the BHC capital standard, for example, Morgan Stanley would either need to reduce its assets or raise $60 billion in capital. If MUFJ bought a 20% stake at the current market price -- for $6 billion -- it would only go 10% of the way to reaching the $93.7 billion in capital needed to support its $1,031 billion in assets at an 11:1 ratio.

Nevertheless, investors are happy about the news, driving Morgan Stanley up 13% in pre-market.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter. He has no financial interest in the securities mentioned.

Launched in 1992, private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners, LLC ("MDP") has grown into a powerhouse. The firm invests in a wide array of industries such as communications, consumer, financial services, health care and so on.

However, MDP is now feeling the pressures from the credit crunch. In raising its next fund, investors have been fairly lukewarm. Instead, MDP is now planning to raise a mere $7.5 billion. The original goal was $10 billion.

Actually, when compared to the 1990s, this is still a pretty big fund and will generate juicy fees. What's more, MDP is likely to get some nice valuations on deals, which should benefit investors over the long haul.

Although, things are far from done. MDP has raised about $4 billion so far, and if the markets continue to be rocky, even the $7.5 billion target could be elusive.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

Nucor (NYSE: NUE) shares are falling after the company announced its plans to raise roughly $3 billion by selling stocks and bonds to raise money to buy other companies and pay off debt. The company intends to sell 25 million shares for more than $2 billion. If you think this stock won't be rising too far in the coming months, then it could be a good time to look at a bearish hedged play on NUE.

After hitting a one-year low of $41.62 in August, the stock has risen to hit its one-year high of $83.56 just last week. This morning, NUE opened at $79.13. So far today the stock has hit a low of $77.38 and a high of $79.61. As of 12:30, NUE is trading at $79.46, down $1.86 (-2.3%). The chart for NUE looks bullish but deteriorating slightly, while S&P gives the stock a neutral 3 STARS (out of 5) hold rating.

For a bearish hedged play on this stock, I would consider a June bear-call credit spread above the $90 range. A bear-call credit spread is an options position that combines the purchase and sale of call options to hedge risk in case the stock doesn't do what you think but still leverage nice returns. For this particular trade, we will make a 6.4% return in five weeks as long as NUE is below $90 at June expiration. Nucor would have to rise by more than 14% before we would start to lose money. Learn more about this type of trade here.