Commercial Contracts

  • June 12, 2024

    'Repugnant To Civility': Judge Rips, Yet Won't DQ Taft Stettinius

    A Michigan state judge slammed law firm Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP for keeping ex-client MGM in the dark about its merger with another firm and called Taft Stettinius' assertion MGM should have figured it out "repugnant to civility," but nonetheless said he wouldn't disqualify Taft Stettinius from representing MGM's opponent in an arbitration.

  • June 12, 2024

    Texas Judge 'Exasperated' By Parties In Skiplagged Suit

    An "exasperated" Texas federal judge on Wednesday ordered American Airlines and airfare search engine Skiplagged Inc. into mediation after the parties ran into their sixth discovery dispute in litigation around Skiplagged's alleged unauthorized ticket sales, saying the court didn't want to referee "countless discovery disputes used as litigation tactics."

  • June 12, 2024

    Axos Bank Can't Arbitrate 'Bait & Switch' Suit, Customers Say

    Customers suing Axos urged a federal judge not to let the bank arbitrate their claims in a consolidated dispute over how it handled interest rates on savings deposit accounts offered through online banking division UFB Direct, arguing that the court, not an arbitrator, must decide arbitrability.

  • June 12, 2024

    Internet Co. Hit With $4M Default Judgment Over Tower Bills

    TPT SpeedConnect has been slapped with a nearly $4 million judgment after it stopped footing the bill on some 60 of its license agreements, which allowed the internet service provider to keep its telecom equipment installed on others' towers in exchange for rent.

  • June 12, 2024

    '83 Wolfpack Suit May Throw NIL Peace For A Loop

    As the NCAA cheered a settlement aimed at marshaling payments to athletes for their names, images and likenesses last week, experts say a new suit from one of college basketball's most historic teams illustrates the shortcomings of a hasty effort to right past wrongs.

  • June 12, 2024

    Oppenheimer, Cybersecurity Co. Settle $12M SPAC Bill Spat

    Oppenheimer & Co. and an Israeli cybersecurity company have reached a settlement to end claims that the company refused to pay $12 million in fees for SPAC merger-related services the investment bank provided, according to a New York federal court filing made Wednesday.

  • June 12, 2024

    Yale Hospital OK With Merging Suits Over Stalled $435M Sale

    Yale New Haven Hospital has consented to combining two dueling lawsuits over its stalled $435 million deal to buy three Connecticut facilities operated by California-based Prospect Medical Holdings Inc., agreeing that judicial efficiency and economy is best served by consolidating both entities' claims into one proceeding.

  • June 12, 2024

    11th Circ. Could Revive Venezuela Chemical Co. Seizure Suit

    An Eleventh Circuit panel appeared open to reviving a lawsuit accusing Venezuela of unlawfully seizing a chemical company amid allegedly trumped-up criminal drug charges, as the judges spent much of a hearing on Wednesday questioning why a critical witness was barred from testifying.

  • June 12, 2024

    Judge Says Biden Admin Must Allow Show Loophole, For Now

    A Texas federal judge has ordered the Biden administration to stop enforcing a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives rule that seeks to close what is known as the gun show loophole by requiring many private sellers to register as dealers and perform background checks before transacting gun sales.

  • June 12, 2024

    Something Fishy With Conagra's '100% Whole Fish,' Suit Says

    Customers alleged in Illinois federal court Tuesday that Conagra misled them by marketing its popular Van de Kamp's and Mrs. Paul's frozen fish products as "100% whole fish," despite artificially adding weight to those fish with an industrial filler and extra water.

  • June 12, 2024

    Doctor Says Lawyer, Insurer Agreed To Backdoor Settlement

    A Colorado neurosurgeon accused an attorney and an insurer of interfering with the legal services provided to him in defense of an underlying medical malpractice suit, telling a state court the underlying suit was settled without his consent, elevating the carrier and its insured's interests over his own.

  • June 12, 2024

    SEC Says Texas Crypto Cases Aren't Related To Fraud Suit

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission asked a Texas federal judge not to stay its case accusing a crypto asset mining and hosting company of securities fraud, saying in a Wednesday brief that the judge's concerns about other pending cases creating "moving-target precedents" were unfounded.

  • June 12, 2024

    Colo. Tech Co. Says Startup Founder Can't Shield Sale Docs

    A Colorado technology company is arguing that the founder of a startup it acquired shouldn't be allowed to withhold nearly half of the documents it is seeking by asserting privilege in his $15 million fraud suit, as he claimed to rely on his law firm's advice when he approved the deal.

  • June 12, 2024

    Ex-WWE Employee's Sex Abuse Suit Paused For 6 Months

    A former World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. legal staffer's sexual abuse and trafficking lawsuit against the company, WWE founder Vince McMahon and a former executive will remain paused until December, a Connecticut federal judge ordered, about two weeks after a prosecutor entered an appearance in the case.

  • June 12, 2024

    Transit Insurer Seeks To Limit Loss From $60M No-Fault Scam

    A taxi and livery insurer told a Brooklyn federal judge Wednesday that it is pursuing settlement in its effort to recoup $3.2 million lost in a massive, $60 million no-fault scam led by a former clinic operator now headed for prison.

  • June 12, 2024

    Pleading Flaw Sinks $1.5M Malpractice Award In Miami

    A Miami appeals court on Wednesday vacated a $1.5 million legal malpractice arbitration award against The Ferraro Law Firm, finding the arbitrator had not followed pleading guidelines fairly in awarding the seven-figure award to the firm's ex-client, Royal Merchant Holdings LLC.

  • June 12, 2024

    Saul Ewing, Atty Allowed 'Unconscionable' Lease, Suit Says

    A former Saul Ewing LLP client who is considered a vulnerable adult is suing the firm and one of its partners, claiming the lawyer failed to negotiate the "unconscionable terms" of a lease that required the client to take out a $400,000 loan and allowed his stepbrother tenant to pay rent one-seventieth the property's market value.

  • June 12, 2024

    Pashman Stein Asks NJ Court To Toss Malpractice Countersuit

    Pashman Stein has asked a New Jersey state court to throw out a malpractice counterclaim in its fee suit against an attorney over unpaid bills for the firm's work on an underlying matter, painting the counterclaims as merely "revisionist history" combined with an "outright deceptive narrative" in an attempt to escape the debt collection.

  • June 12, 2024

    Nelson Mullins Partner's Widow Must Arbitrate Pay Dispute

    The estate of a Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP partner who died last year is bound by a partnership agreement that requires disputes to be resolved through arbitration, a Massachusetts judge said in dismissing a suit brought by the attorney's widow.

  • June 11, 2024

    Musk Drops Suit Against OpenAI On Eve Of Dismissal Hearing

    Elon Musk on Tuesday voluntarily dismissed his suit accusing former business partner and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman of betraying his promises to run the artificial intelligence operation as a nonprofit, a move that comes the day before a hearing was set on OpenAI's dismissal bid.

  • June 11, 2024

    2nd Circ. Cites Macquarie In Booting Suit Over Go-Private Deal

    The Second Circuit refused to revive a proposed class action accusing a real estate services provider of artificially depressing share prices, applying apparently for the first time the U.S. Supreme Court's Macquarie decision on alleged failures to disclose certain information.

  • June 11, 2024

    DC Circ. Affirms Petrobras' Immunity Denial In Fraud Case

    The D.C. Circuit on Tuesday affirmed the denial of Petrobras' immunity defense against an investor fraud lawsuit filed after the petroleum company was implicated in a sprawling bribery scheme, ruling that the alleged fraud caused a direct impact on the United States sufficient to pull Petrobras into the court's jurisdiction.

  • June 11, 2024

    St. Kitts Electric Co. Claims Win In $2.7M ICC Arbitration

    St. Kitts Electricity Company Ltd. has announced its successful defense of an approximately $2.7 million international arbitration brought against it by Pure Energy Solutions Ltd., saying an arbitrator decided it didn't breach the two companies' fuel supply agreement.

  • June 11, 2024

    Quinn Emanuel Swapped Sides For X Suit, Data Co. Says

    Israeli data collector Bright Data Ltd. asked a California federal judge on Tuesday to disqualify law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP from representing social media company X Corp., which is suing Bright Data over its data-scraping practices, accusing the firm, which was once contracted by the data company for advice in a similar matter, of switching sides.

  • June 11, 2024

    HashiCorp Hit With Investor Suit Over $6.4B Sale To IBM

    Software company HashiCorp Inc. and its board members face an investor suit seeking to halt an upcoming shareholder vote on a proposed $6.4 billion acquisition of HashiCorp by tech giant IBM, alleging the deal would unfairly benefit company insiders and hasn't been properly detailed in required filings.

Expert Analysis

  • 10 Areas To Watch In Aerospace And Defense Contracting Law

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    The near future holds a number of key areas to watch in aerospace and defense contracting law, ranging from dramatic developments in the space industry to recent National Defense Authorization Act updates, which are focused on U.S. leadership in emerging technologies, say Joseph Berger and Chip Purcell at Thompson Hine.

  • Meta Data Scraping Case Has Lessons For Platforms, AI Cos.

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    The California federal court ruling that artificial intelligence company Bright Data's scraping of public data from Meta social media sites does not constitute a breach of contract signals that platforms should review their terms of service and AI companies could face broad implications for their training of algorithms, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • Opinion

    Judicial Independence Is Imperative This Election Year

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    As the next election nears, the judges involved in the upcoming trials against former President Donald Trump increasingly face political pressures and threats of violence — revealing the urgent need to safeguard judicial independence and uphold the rule of law, says Benes Aldana at the National Judicial College.

  • Series

    Riding My Peloton Bike Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Using the Peloton platform for cycling, running, rowing and more taught me that fostering a mind-body connection will not only benefit you physically and emotionally, but also inspire stamina, focus, discipline and empathy in your legal career, says Christopher Ward at Polsinelli.

  • Spartan Arbitration Tactics Against Well-Funded Opponents

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    Like the ancient Spartans who held off a numerically superior Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae, trial attorneys and clients faced with arbitration against an opponent with a bigger war chest can take a strategic approach to create a pass to victory, say Kostas Katsiris and Benjamin Argyle at Venable.

  • What 2 Years Of Ukraine-Russia Conflict Can Teach Cos.

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    A few key legal lessons for the global business community since Russia's invasion of Ukraine could help protect global commerce in times of future conflict, including how to respond to disparate trade restrictions and sanctions, navigate war-related contract disputes, and protect against heightened cybersecurity risks, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Assessing 2 Years Of High Court's Arbitration Waiver Ruling

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    In the two years since the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Morgan v. Sundance, clarifying that no special rules apply to waiver of arbitration provisions, the ruling has had immediate ramifications in federal courts, but it may take some time for the effects to be felt on other federal issues and in state courts, say attorneys at Norton Rose.

  • What Recent Study Shows About AI's Promise For Legal Tasks

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    Amid both skepticism and excitement about the promise of generative artificial intelligence in legal contexts, the first randomized controlled trial studying its impact on basic lawyering tasks shows mixed but promising results, and underscores the need for attorneys to proactively engage with AI, says Daniel Schwarcz at University of Minnesota Law School.

  • The Epic Antitrust Cases And Challenges Of Injunctive Relief

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    The Epic cases against Apple and Google offer a window into the courts' considerable challenges in Big Tech litigation and establishing injunctive relief that enhances competition and benefits consumers, say Kelly Lear Nordby and Jon Tomlin at Ankura Consulting.

  • UMG-TikTok IP Rift Highlights Effective Rights Control Issues

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    Despite Universal Music Group's recent withdrawal of TikTok's licensing rights to its music catalog, the platform struggles to control uploads and reproductions of copyrighted material, highlighting the inherent tension between creative freedom and effective rights control in the age of social media, says Simon Goodbody at Bray & Krais.

  • Fintech 'Prenups': Planning For A Card Program Breakup

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    After a year of economic downturns, some banks and their fintech partners are realizing they may have rushed to the altar without a good prenup, but planning ahead can curb both foreseeable and unexpected issues in the event of a termination of a bank-fintech card-issuing agreement, say Andrew Grant at Ketsal and Richard Malish at Community Federal Savings Bank.

  • 3 Notification Pitfalls To Avoid With Arbitration Provisions

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    In Lipsett v. Popular Bank, the Second Circuit found that a bank's arbitration provision was unenforceable due to insufficient notice to a customer that he was bound by the agreement, highlighting the importance of adequate communication of arbitration provisions, and customers' options for opting out, say attorneys at Covington.

  • 2nd Circ.'s Nine West Ruling Clarifies Safe Harbor Confusion

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    The Second Circuit’s recent ruling in Nine West’s Chapter 11 suit clarifies that courts in the circuit will apply a transfer-by-transfer analysis to determine the applicability of Section 546(e) of the Bankruptcy Code, and that to be safe harbored, a financial institution must act as an agent with respect to the specific transfer at issue, says Leonardo Trivigno at Carter Ledyard.

  • Litigation Inspiration: A Source Of Untapped Fulfillment

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    As increasing numbers of attorneys struggle with stress and mental health issues, business litigators can find protection against burnout by remembering their important role in society — because fulfillment in one’s work isn’t just reserved for public interest lawyers, say Bennett Rawicki and Peter Bigelow at Hilgers Graben.

  • What FTC's 'Killer Acquisition' Theory Means For Pharma Cos.

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    The Federal Trade Commission's recent lawsuit to block Sanofi's acquisition of a pharmaceutical treatment developed by Maze Therapeutics builds on previous enforcement actions and could indicate the agency's growing willingness to use its so-called killer acquisition theory against perceived attempts to eliminate nascent competition, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

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