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Here's something we never thought we'd see. John Lydon - formerly Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols - in a TV commercial. For Country Life butter! Extraordinary. And what a fine performance from Lydon. A new career beckons. Hearty congratulations to agency Grey London. Now wrap your brain around this bizarre Spanish cinema ad for clothing line Black Thinking, executed by local agency Road. We particularly like the giant fly reading a newspaper. Keep your eyes peeled for it. Bartle Bogle Hegarty's current Audi campaign comprises one stunning ad after another. This new spot, Hands, is arguably the finest so far. Effortlessly brilliant. And finally, we love this ad for Canadian milk producer BC Dairy, by DDB Canada. There are others on the associated website MustDrinkMoreMilk.com, which is definitely worth a visit. What is it about milk that brings out the best in ad agencies? One more for the road. Clothing company Diesel is celebrating its 30th anniversary next week. It's throwing a huge global party to celebrate the occasion, and has released a new viral video to promote the event, featuring clips culled from old 80s porn movies but with the rude bits obscured by innocent animations. The Viral Factory is responsible. We would love to have featured this as one of our Ads of the Week but despite its claim to be "safe for work" (SFW) it just so is not. It is quite brilliant though. See it here.

In the news this past week: Advertisers

Where did all the good news go? The world's financial markets are trapped on a nailbiting rollercoaster ride that took its hairiest turns to-date this week. When Congress rejected the US government's bailout plan on Monday, the Dow Jones Index plummeted by almost 780 points, its biggest ever fall, eliminating $1.2 trillion of shareholder value in just a few hours. A day later, it regained almost half that fall in a sharp upward swing, before falling and rising, falling and rising over the rest of the week. You could almost hear the screams. Any semblance of stability will be dependent on what happens tomorrow, when House of Representatives is expected to consider a revised plan, already approved by the Senate. 

Some US marketers blamed the rejection of the original plan on poor branding, suggesting that it would have passed first time had it been better presented or explained in simpler terms. A key error was its description as a "bailout", according to a statement issued jointly by Euro RSCG New York and public affairs consultancy National Media Group: "'Bailout' connotates failure," says the statement, "and Americans hate failure - unless there is the promise of a second act where the hero finds redemption. There is nothing redemptive about a bailout, no thanks for the one providing it. Only mutual embarrassment for having arrived at the scornful eventuality. What if this had been called a 'rescue' from the beginning? Or the 'Save our Homes Act'? Supporting a 'rescue' is a bear of an entirely different species. It is not only a redemptive act, restoring things to their rightful order - it is heroic."

In the meantime, there was a bloodbath in the banking industry, as a string of institutions around the globe either failed or sought government protection to avoid collapse. The latest cycle began last Thursday evening, when US savings and loan Washington Mutual took the ignominious prize of becoming the biggest bank failure in history. So far. Despite assets of $307bn and total deposits of $188bn, WaMu was unable to continue trading because of a collapse in confidence. Fearful of an impending failure, depositors began rushing to withdraw funds two weeks ago. Almost $17bn of deposits were withdrawn in the ten days after September 16th. As a result, US regulators seized control of the bank, and agreed to sell all its remaining deposits, assets and some of its liabilities, including its troubled mortgage portfolio, to JPMorgan Chase for around $1.9bn. Chase will also take over WaMu's retail outlets, creating the country's second-largest network, with 5,400 branch offices in 23 states. It extends Chase's footprint into new states such as Georgia, Idaho, Nevada and Oregon. Earlier this year, JPMorgan also rescued failing investment bank Bear Stearns. 

On Monday, Wachovia, America's 6th largest lender, joined the list of casualties. Following the collapse of merger talks with Wells Fargo, Citigroup stepped in to buy out Wachovia's banking operations for around $2.2bn. Citigroup will take over responsibility for around $700bn of Wachovia's mortgage and loan portfolio, although almost half of that sum is being underwritten by the US government. The addition of Wachovia's branch network, much of which is in areas where Citi does not already have a strong presence, will expand its coverage to 4,300 US retail outlets. Its US customer deposits will increase to around $600m. The remainder of Wachovia, comprising its asset management, retail brokerage, and parts of its wealth management businesses, will remain an independently owned public company. The takeover virtually wiped out Wachovia's shareholders, who will receive just $1 in Citi stock for shares that were worth $10 apiece last week. ** Updated 3rd Oct: Before the ink was even dry on that deal, Wells Fargo nipped back in to trump Citi's offer. It agreed to acquire all of Wachovia, including its asset management and other units, for $15.4bn. In addition, it agreed to do without any government guarantees on Wachovia's mortgages.

The collapse and breakup of WaMu and Wachovia was accompanied by a string of other emergency rescues around the globe. Belgium's biggest bank Fortis, also the country's largest private sector employer, became the first major victim of the crisis in mainland Europe. Following the collapse of rescue talks with BNP Paribas of France and Dutch group ING over the weekend, the business was partly nationalised, its effective ownership split between the governments of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg, each of whom agreed to acquire a 49% holding in the bank's local operations for a combined total of E11.2bn. The fate of ABN Amro, the Dutch bank whose part-purchase by Fortis earlier this year was a major factor in its current predicament, is hard to predict. ING declined an opportunity to take it off Fortis's hands, and Dutch regulators are likely to pass the buck to Royal Bank of Scotland, who led the ABN Amro acquisition.

In the UK, the British government confirmed that it would nationalise struggling savings bank Bradford & Bingley. Its £50bn mortgage and loan portfolio was taken over by the government, while its 200 or so branches and £20bn of customer deposits were sold to Santander of Spain for around £400m. That deal confirms Santander as one of the UK's most powerful banks, with around £112m in customer deposits, and almost 1,300 branches, although many of these are likely to be consolidated. The Spanish bank has built its presence in the UK entirely from scratch, acquiring the former Abbey National in 2004, and adding to its footprint earlier this year with the rescue of another struggling lender Alliance & Leicester.

The domino effect from these rescues rolled on around the globe. On Tuesday, the Franco-Belgian bank Dexia, which specialises in local government finance, was bailed out with government funds to avoid its collapse; the government of Iceland took over that country's third largest bank, Glitnir, at a cost of E600m in emergency funding; and a consortium comprising several German banks and the federal government agreed to underwrite E35bn of credit for mortgage lender Hypo Real Estate. In the Irish Republic, the government sought to bolster confidence in its own major lenders by guaranteeing all debts and savings held by its six biggest banks. That led to calls for a similar pledge from the UK government. In France, President Sarkozy called for the creation of a E300bn European fund to match the US bailout -  sorry - rescue. Not even General Electric was immune from the crisis. It made arrangements to secure the support of billionaire Warren Buffet for a rights issue to bolster its struggling consumer and property finance division. In similar fashion to his investment last week in Goldman Sachs, Buffett agreed to purchase $3bn of preferred stock in GE.

Meanwhile, in China, the effects of the country's milk poisoning scandal began to reverberate beyond the mainland. Cadbury, Heinz and Unilever each took steps to withdraw products made in China because of possible or actual adulteration with melamine, an industrial chemical which is said to have sickened more than 50,000 Chinese children since the beginning of September. It is believed that milk was diluted by unscrupulous local producers to make it go further. The high nitrogen content in melamine can fool tests designed to verify protein levels in milk, which would have flagged up other diluting agents such as water. Tainted milk powders have been discovered at more than 20 Chinese manufacturers. Cadbury has withdrawn all of its confectionery products made in China, while Unilever withdrew multiple batches of Lipton powdered teas in Hong Kong after finding traces of melamine. Heinz has suspended exports of some of its Chinese-made baby foods into Hong Kong pending a full investigation. Nestle and Mars have also begun testing products for contamination. 

Among other developments this week, Rob Malcolm, Diageo's president, global marketing, sales & innovation since 2000, announced his intention to step down at the end of the year. His role is being split. Andy Fennell will take over as chief marketing officer; Ron Anderson will take on the new role of chief customer officer. Meanwhile over at Dr Pepper Snapple Group in the US, Jim Trebilcock replaced Randy Gier as chief marketing officer.

This week we took our minds off the economic doom and gloom with two new promotional websites. Metrotwin is a new social networking site established by British Airways to attach some extra buzz to BA's TransAtlantic service. Customers are invited to suggest cool places to visit in the "twinned" cities of New York and London. At first sight, it all looks a little Londoncentric (no bad thing, we say, but then we're Londonians). Nevertheless, it's a nice idea and well put together. The trick will be how to stop shop and hotel and restaurant owners in the two cities from merely using it as a vehicle to promote their own wares. And then, with all the bleak economic news, who can afford to fly... ? You may prefer to spend your time designing your very own trouser snake. Yes, you read that right, it's exactly what we mean. Or rather what Levi's means. As part of its Live Unbuttoned campaign, Levi's has launched a slightly naughty website which invites you to UnbuttonYourBeast. Customise the creature which lives inside your flies and then send it to friends. Choose from options including Saucy Sal, Paul The Pincher and Sir Reginald Mighty Pants, whose catchphrase, by the way, is "My sword may be tiny, but my poke is mighty." Nice. Go ahead and look, it's much safer for work than the Diesel viral.

In the news this past week: Agencies

WPP's takeover of TNS looks like it might now squeeze through after a very slow start. Against the repeated advice of the TNS board, a growing number of shareholders have opted to accept WPP's offer, encouraged by the worsening economic outlook and the draft approval of the merger by EU regulators. By the first deadline for acceptance on Sept 11th, only a little more than 11% of shareholders had responded to WPP's offer, prompting Sir Martin Sorrell to extend the cut-off point by a further two weeks. Another 22% of shareholders caved during that period, bringing acceptances up to just over a third of the total equity, and Sorrell has now pushed back the deadline by a further week, until 3pm tomorrow. By Monday afternoon, WPP had gained the support of almost 43% of TNS shareholders. The offer price is unchanged. Also this week, Sorrell announced plans to transfer WPP's corporate headquarters from London to the Republic of Ireland for tax purposes. The group is seeking to avoid the sharp increase in its annual tax bill which would be caused by proposed changes to the tax rate on foreign subsidiaries of British companies. Sorrell told BBC Radio's Today programme, "It was a significant economic decision. It is a difficult decision but it was one the board felt it had to make in the interests of shareholders."

One more WPP story this week. The group takes the prize for the biggest, shortest account win in recent memory. Only last Friday, a collection of WPP-owned agencies were awarded the $150m marketing account for Wachovia Bank. Ogilvy was appointed for creative, Maxus for media, and Soho Square was charged with direct and promotional marketing. By Monday, those contracts had effectively been torn up as a result of the buy-out of Wachovia by Citi. According to Wachovia's spokesperson Mary Beth Navarro, "Wachovia has paused the finalization of our agreement with Ogilvy. We will work closely with our Ogilvy partners and our future colleagues at Citigroup to determine the best way to support our brands and our businesses going forward."

Campaign suggests that a rapprochement is underway between TBWA in the UK and its former leaders Trevor Beattie, Andrew McGuinness and Bill Bungay. That trio quit TBWA in 2005 after a run of account losses, setting up their own agency, now BMB. Campaign says that Omnicom is in talks to buy the shop and merge it back into TBWA\London, handing management control to the BMB partners. Campaign also carries the story that the famed agency brand CDP is finally to be erased from the industry at the end of the year. Once the UK's most celebrated advertising agency, CDP's fortunes have waned dramatically since a heyday in the 1970s and 1980s. It was acquired by Dentsu of Japan in 1990, and was later merged with the Travis Sully integrated agency, becoming cdptravissully. The CDP London brand was resurrected in 2006. In January 2009 it will adopt the new name of Dentsu London.

Omnicom is to give its backing to the creation of a new dedicated agency which will take over multicultural marketing on the Nissan account. The Japanese carmaker is insisting that the new shop must be controlled by minority group shareholders from the African-American, Hispanic and Asian communities. However it must also draw upon the expertise of Omnicom's Dieste Harmel and Footsteps agencies, as well as independent but affiliated Asian-American agency Admerasia. Omnicom has a majority shareholding in Hispanic shop Dieste Harmel, and a minority stake in African-American agency Footsteps. It is expected to take up to a 49% stake in the new, as yet unnamed shop.

MillerCoors, the joint venture which now controls the US brewery operations of SABMiller and Molson Coors, called a review of all media, currently split between Starcom (Miller) and Initiative (Coors). The brewer aims to consolidate the business in a single agency. It's not hard to guess which of the two incumbents is the favourite to seize the whole account. 

Among other assignments, Vodafone called a review of Australian media, out of Ikon; M&C Saatchi is to take over UK creative for Hyundai Motors, in partnership with the car company's inhouse agency Innocean; Adidas placed global digital creative with Riot, a new boutique established in Amsterdam by TBWA and 180; Lastminute.com selected Karmarama for UK creative. For all other appointments, subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here.

In the news this past week: Media

It was a bad week for UK satellite broadcaster Sky. An appeal tribunal upheld the decision by the Competition Commission to force it to reduce its shareholding in terrestrial network ITV from almost 18% to less than 7.5%. At the same time, the tribunal supported a complaint from Virgin Media that the original investigation had not gone far enough, suggesting that Sky could ultimately be forced to sell all of its shares. As a result of the dramatic fall in ITV's share price, Sky's shares in that company are now worth less than a third of the £940m they cost in November 2006. In its last financial accounts, Sky wrote off almost £620m against the shares, generating a net loss for the year. A separate investigation by broadcasting watchdog Ofcom proposed that the satellite television operator should sell its live football and blockbuster movies to rivals such as Virgin Media and Setanta Sports at regulated wholesale prices. For the time being, however, Ofcom declined to refer that issue to the Competition Commission.

Microsoft announced plans to incentivise web users to use its search engine instead of Google. Under the new Search Perks scheme, consumers will win "tickets" each time they use Windows Live Search. These can be accumulated and exchanged for items such as T-shirts or music downloads, or even potentially air miles. Rewards are limited to 50 searches a day, and the programme will initially be restricted to 250,000 people.

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Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands

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