Lawmakers are gearing up to vote on a $700 billion financial bailout plan, but the rescue from Capitol Hill didn’t come soon enough for Wachovia — whose assets are being acquired by Citigroup — or for Fortis NV, Hypo Real Estate and Bradford & Bingley, which were nationalized by European governments on Monday.

“Wachovia did not fail; rather, it is to be acquired by Citigroup Inc on an open bank basis with assistance from the FDIC,” the agency said in a statement. Still in doubt is the status of brokerage AG Edwards and asset manager Evergreen, which are not included in the deal.

Wasn’t it only two weeks ago that Wachovia was in talks to merge with Morgan Stanley?

DEALS OF THE DAY

** Nokia Oyj is in advanced talks to sell its security appliances business to a financial investor, while it would halt its corporate software development, it said.

** Italy’s ENEL and Czech CEZ submitted bids to buy up to 76 percent of Albania’s power distributor while Austria’s EVN and Energie Steirmark withdrew, a government commission said.

** Iceland took control of its third largest bank, Glitnir as the global credit market turmoil claimed its latest victim following a string of financial collapses in the United States and Europe.

** Kazakhstan’s No.1 insurer Eurasia said it had made a formal offer to buy the local subsidiary of AIG, the insurer bailed out by the U.S. Federal Reserve earlier this month.

** Athletic shoe and clothing chain Foot Locker Inc said it plans to buy Delias Inc’s CCS business for $102 million, as it seeks to boost its appeal with teen-age skateboarders.

** Private equity firms Bain Capital LLC and Hellman & Friedman LLC were closer to a deal on Sunday night to buy Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc’s prized Neuberger Berman unit, two sources familiar with the situation said.

** A buyout of Japanese property firm Daito Trust Construction Co is unlikely to get done this year due to difficulty in raising funds for the deal estimated at $6 billion, financial industry sources said.

** Kazakh gold miner KasakhGold said it had received a possible cash and shares offer for 50.1 percent of the company from Russia’s top gold producer Polyus Gold.

** German lender Hypo Real Estate struck a last-minute deal with a consortium of banks for credit to resolve a refinancing squeeze that it faced, the group said.

** Singapore’s Neptune Orient Lines said it has submitted a binding bid to acquire the Hapag-Lloyd container shipping business but declined to provide details of its bid.

** Kookmin Bank cut the value of its planned sale of shares in Bank Internasional Indonesia to reflect a revision to Maybank’s bid for the Indonesian lender.

** Australian steel company OneSteel Ltd said it would make a NZ$175 million ($120 million) offer for its partly owned New Zealand subsidiary, Steel and Tube Holdings Ltd.

Japanese banking heavyweight Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group has tarted up its offer for California bank UnionBanCal by 17 percent to $3.5 billion. That’s $73.5 per share and above the $70 that market insiders were expecting. MUFG already owns 35 percent of the California lender, and is hoping that more exposure to the subprime stricken west coast will help revitalize its core business. Analysts are skeptical this strategy - no matter how cheap or well insulated from the subprime meltdown the U.S. assets appear - will have the desired results. MUFG’s first quarter net profit fell by 66 percent on a lousy economy and anemic credit conditions, and the bank has forecast virtually no growth this year. Investors looking to get a foot in the door could be betting that banks with significant foreign stakes will be more likely to be pursued.

Nothing humming for GM in Asia. Mahindra & Mahindra, India’s top utility vehicle maker, says it is not interested in buying the brand that has become synonymous with the guzzling of gas, but will instead focus on its own models for the key U.S. market. “There has been a lot of speculation. I want to say categorically we are not pursuing Hummer,” Vice Chairman Anand Mahindra said at a news conference. In China, a source says Hunan Changfeng Motor has backed off from preliminary takeover talks. GM has explored a sale in Russia, as well, sources have said. Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska’s car unit, Russian Machines, last week also denied it was seeking to buy Hummer.

Bankers for Bradford & Bingley have been left to sell over 70 percent of its 400 million pound cash call, the UK lender said, as it hired the former head of rival Alliance & Leicester to draw a line under its troubles. The mortgage bank, which has seen a torrid three months since it first surprised the market with news of an emergency rights issue, named City veteran Richard Pym as chief executive with immediate effect. Underwriters Citi and UBS now have until Friday to place the remainder of the cut-price, twice-restructured offering.

Michael Page Chief Executive Steve Ingham has reiterated his demand for Britain’s Takeover Panel to issue a “put up or shut up” notice to Swiss suitor Adecco, the world’s biggest staffing agency. Ingham admitted, however, that the group’s Friday rejection of Adecco’s 400 pence a share or 1.3 billion pound ($2.43 billion) offer proposal is “not the end of the matter”. Earlier, Adecco said it was keeping all options open and refused to rule out a hostile offer. Adecco has said it will keep pursuing Michael Page despite the rejection.

Other deals of the day:

* South Korea’s STX Group said it was more than doubling its stake in No. 1 European ship maker Aker Yards, to 88.4 percent through a $635.5 million tender offer as it seeks to grow its portfolio of businesses.

* POSCO, the world’s No.4 steelmaker, is seeking to partner up with a financial firm and South Korea’s National Pension Service to bid for Daewoo Shipbuilding, a source close to the situation said.

* Dabur Pharma said the World Bank’s private sector lender, International Finance Corp, has sold its entire shareholding of 12.14 million shares in the company.

When Wachovia CEO Ken Thompson announced plans to cut up to 500 jobs last month, he probably didn’t expect to be included in the total. The bank ousted Thompson on Monday following a series of disappointments that hurt the fourth-largest U.S. bank and its performance. Wachovia said Thompson is retiring at the request of its board of directors; Lanty Smith, the bank’s chairman, was named interim CEO. The bank’s stock was lower before the open. Wachovia has marked down mortgage and other debt assets by $5 billion so far in the credit crunch.

“Harris is not pursuing any transaction. We’re not for sale,” Howard Lance, chairman, president and CEO of the defense communications company, told Reuters in a telephone interview. Lance said Harris normally does not comment on rumors or speculation, but decided to issue a statement because the “level of rhetoric had risen to a point that it was becoming a distraction and could be damaging to the company, and could fuel speculation in our stock.” One industry analyst last week told Reuters that General Dynamics recently made an informal overture to Harris, but dropped it amid its own management succession. Northrop Grumman also looked into a possible bid for Harris but balked at the high valuation, the analyst added.

China unveiled two mega-deals as the government overhauls the world’s largest telecoms industry, with mobile operator Unicom taking over a fixed-line peer and unloading an underperforming network. Unicom, the smaller rival of China Mobile, said it will issue new shares and swap 1.5 shares for every share in Netcom, the smaller of China’s two fixed-line carriers. Unicom is set to pay more than $55 billion for Netcom, but did not say how it arrived at that figure — which would be more than double Netcom’s current market value. Unicom also agreed to sell a wireless network to fixed-line leader China Telecom and its parent for 110 billion yuan ($15.2 billion). The announcements mark the first steps in a sweeping restructuring that is expected to usher China into a more advanced telecoms age while opening the door to foreign investment and billions of dollars in purchases from telecoms gear makers. China Telecom appears to be paying up for a network that only broke even in 2006 after years of losses and which is a third of the size of Unicom’s GSM communications network, which raked in 62.78 billion yuan in revenue in 2007.

Britain’s Bradford & Bingley said U.S. private equity firm TPG Capital would to take a 23 percent stake in the bank, its first major UK bank investment, for around 179 million pounds ($353 million). The purchase makes TPG the single largest investor in the country’s biggest buy-to-let lender. The private equity group’s surprise swoop mirrors moves by strategic investors shoring up U.S. banks as financial institutions across the world have struggled with writedowns, the impact of the credit crunch and the prospect of recession. B&B issued a stark warning on the state of the UK mortgage market, hitting bank shares across Europe. Just three weeks after it last spoke to investors, B&B said it had tumbled to a loss for the first four months of the year and saw continued pressure on margins, as funding costs remain high, and arrears deteriorate more than expected

Other deals of the day:

* General Electric said it had finalized plans of a deal announced in March for GE Commercial Finance to acquire Banco Santander ’s Italian commercial bank Interbanca, and the Spanish bank agreed to buy GE Money’s businesses in Germany, Finland and Austria, and its card and auto businesses in U.K.

* South Africa’s Telkom has had an offer from a Vodafone unit for its half of mobile operator Vodacom, while Mvelaphanda may lead a bid for the whole group minus the Vodacom stake, Telkom said.

* Royal Dutch Shell said it will pay $739 million for an interest in Arrow Energy’s coal seam gas projects, as competition heats up for Australia’s vast coal seam gas assets, driving Arrow shares up by a fifth.

* Australian clothing retailer Just Group rejected a hostile A$836 million ($800 million) bid by billionaire investor Solomon Lew, citing an independent adviser as saying the offer was too low.

* Robert Bosch has agreed to buy 50.45 percent of solar power company Ersol for 546.4 million euros ($845.7 million) from Ventizz Capital and plans a public offer for the rest, Bosch and Ersol said.

* Lodging real estate investment trust Sunstone Hotel Investors said it had sold a hotel for about $366.5 million, and cut its second-quarter and full-year adjusted funds from operations outlook.

* French engineering group Alstom denied a newspaper report it was mulling a tie-up with British aero engine and turbines group Rolls-Royce.

* Colonia Real Estate and Merrill Lynch said they had bought a German residential property portfolio for about 103 million euros ($159.4 million) from Bonn-based Wohnbau.

* Finnish builder YIT said it had bought building automation system maker Computec.

* Norwegian oilfield services group Scorpion Offshore advised shareholders to reject a takeover offer by Oslo-listed rival Seadrill.

* Four candidates have been short-listed to buy French electrical engineering firm Cegelec, French daily La Tribune reported.

* Shyam Star Gems said its board has approved a proposal to acquire up to 50 percent stake in Thamina Diamonds International DMCC Dubai.

* Associated British Foods said it was to merge its Ryvita crispbread unit with the UK breakfast cereals Jordans business with AB Foods set to have a 62 percent share of the combined business.

* Australian alcoholic beverages group Lion Nathan said it had acquired U.S. wine importer Cumulus Wine, giving no price details.