NASCAR has agreed to give its race teams permanent contracts as part of an otherwise confidential settlement that cut short a high-profile antitrust trial in which two teams — including one owned by retired NBA star Michael Jordan — accused it of illegally maintaining a monopoly on premier stock car racing.
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SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13, 2025 Law360 iOS App Law360 Android App Follow Law360 on Facebook Follow Law360 on LinkedIn Follow Law360 on Twitter

TOP NEWS

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NASCAR Inks Midtrial Antitrust Deal With Teams

By Hayley Fowler

NASCAR has agreed to give its race teams permanent contracts as part of an otherwise confidential settlement that cut short a high-profile antitrust trial in which two teams — including one owned by retired NBA star Michael Jordan — accused it of illegally maintaining a monopoly on premier stock car racing.

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Visa Defeats Payments Co.'s 'Muddled' Antitrust Suit

By Rae Ann Varona

A California federal judge Thursday dismissed a payment solutions company's lawsuit accusing Visa Inc. of monopolizing the card payment processing services market, criticizing the company's latest complaint as being "harder to follow" than one previously tossed and still failing to allege any antitrust injury.

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9th Circ. Upholds Apple App Store Injunction In Epic Fight

By Dorothy Atkins

The Ninth Circuit mostly affirmed an injunction blocking Apple Inc. from charging developers "prohibitive" commissions on iPhone app purchases made outside its systems on Thursday, handing Epic Games Inc. a partial win in their hotly contested compliance fight while agreeing with Apple that the injunction's commissions ban and certain restrictions are punitive and overbroad.

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FTC, Amazon Want To Delay Antitrust Trial By 7 Weeks

By Bryan Koenig

As they try to get back on track after the government shutdown, the Federal Trade Commission and Amazon asked a Washington federal judge Wednesday to push back the start of the antitrust trial accusing the online retail giant of creating an artificial pricing floor.

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6th Circ. Panel Shows No Leanings On PBM Jurisdiction Fight

By Mark Payne

A Sixth Circuit appeals panel gave few hints Thursday on whether it would send back to state court a lawsuit from Ohio alleging that pharmacy benefit managers were driving up prescription prices through rebate schemes. 

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Visa Escapes Investor Suit Over DOJ Claims

By Sydney Price

A California federal judge has released Visa from a securities fraud suit accusing it of concealing anticompetitive debit practices that are the subject of a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice, saying the plaintiffs did not show that Visa's alleged omissions caused investors losses.

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MVP

MVP: Simpson Thacher's Sara Y. Razi

By Bryan Koenig

Sara Y. Razi of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP played a key role in defeating a major Federal Trade Commission merger challenge, earning her a spot as one of the 2025 Law360 Competition MVPs.

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MERGER REVIEW

DOJ-UnitedHealth Deal Requiring Home Health Sale OK'd

By Bryan Koenig

A Maryland federal judge signed off on the U.S. Department of Justice settlement resolving its challenge to UnitedHealth's $3.3 billion acquisition of home health and hospice company Amedisys, under a deal requiring the sale of least 164 locations across 19 states.

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FTC Challenges $725M Construction Adhesives Deal

By Bryan Koenig

The Federal Trade Commission filed suit Thursday in New York federal court to challenge a $725 million merger combining Loctite with Liquid Nails, arguing that joining "the clear top two brands of construction adhesives" would drive up costs for home building and improvement.

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INTERNATIONAL

Microsoft Battles Proposed £2.1B Server License Abuse Claim

By Ronan Barnard

A competition lawyer argued at a London antitrust tribunal Thursday that she should be allowed to bring a case potentially worth £2.1 billion ($2.8 billion) on behalf of thousands of businesses against Microsoft for allegedly charging abusive license fees for Windows Server, its server operating system.

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LITIGATION

9th Circ. Won't Rethink Vegas Hotels' Win In Price-Fixing Suit

By Ben Adlin

The Ninth Circuit on Thursday rejected Las Vegas hotel guests' request for the full appeals court to reconsider a panel's August ruling that threw out their proposed class action accusing the casino-hotel operators of using software to illegally inflate room rates.

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Agri Stats Says DOJ Wants To 'Leapfrog' Pork Pricing Claims

By Matthew Perlman

Agri Stats urged a Minnesota federal court to reject the Justice Department's bid to "leapfrog" a set of private antitrust cases involving pork prices by using a scheduled May trial for its information sharing claims against the data firm instead.

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Zillow Cases Over Agent Steering, Kickbacks Merge In Wash.

By Nate Beck

A Washington federal judge on Thursday appointed Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP and DiCello Levitt LLP as interim co-lead counsel over consolidated claims that Zillow paid kickbacks to brokers for referrals to its own mortgage services, among other anticompetitive conduct using company agents.

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Epic Systems Is Monopolizing EHR Market, Texas AG Suit Says

By Gianna Ferrarin

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton hit Epic Systems Corp. with an antitrust suit in state court on Wednesday alleging the company is illegally seeking to monopolize markets for electronic health records software.

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Marketing Agency Accuses Ex-Employee Of Defamation

By Rachel Konieczny

An online marketing agency has sued a former employee in Colorado state court alleging the former employee engaged in an online "smear campaign" against the agency to steer business to his competitor marketing company.

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Connell Foley Beats DQ Bid In NJ Investment Bias Case

By Jake Maher

A federal judge on Thursday threw out a renewed bid by an investment firm suing the state of New Jersey to disqualify the state's counsel at Connell Foley LLP, finding there was no previous attorney-client relationship to justify disqualification.

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PEOPLE

Bradley Arant Adds Former Hilgers Graben Name Partner

By Lynn LaRowe

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP has strengthened its litigation practice with a partner in Dallas who came aboard from Hilgers Graben PLLC, where he was a founder of that firm's Dallas shop.

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Brief

Texas Business Group CEO Resigns After Sexual Assault Suit

By Spencer Brewer

The CEO of Texas' largest business association has stepped down after a woman who founded a business advocacy group said he attempted to coerce her into a sexual relationship and then assaulted her when she rejected his advances. 

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EXPERT ANALYSIS

Calling The AI Witness In 2026's Merger Reviews

Organizations that anticipate facing a second request or merger clearance review in 2026 should collect artificial intelligence artifacts as part of discovery, and distinguish between human-generated and machine-generated materials, says Sean McDermott at FTI Consulting.

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Series

Knitting Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Stretching my skills as a knitter makes me a better antitrust attorney by challenging me to recalibrate after wrong turns, not rush outcomes, and trust that I can teach myself the skills to tackle new and difficult projects — even when I don’t have a pattern to work from, says Kara Kuritz at V&E.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

Wash. Justices Retroactively Lower Bar Exam's Passing Score

By Ben Adlin

As Washington state is preparing to transition to a new bar exam, its Supreme Court has ordered a retroactive adjustment to the current exam's minimum passing score, making an estimated hundred-plus law school graduates who narrowly failed in recent years newly eligible for admission to practice law.

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In Case You Missed It: Hottest Firms And Stories On Law360

For those who missed out, here's a look back at the law firms, stories and expert analyses that generated the most buzz on Law360 last week.

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Dems Demand Release Of 2nd Jack Smith Report

By Courtney Bublé

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee wrote to Attorney General Pam Bondi on Friday demanding she release the second volume of former special counsel Jack Smith's report on President Donald Trump's retention of classified documents after he left office the first time.

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Roundup

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

By Laura Stewart Liberty

This past week in London has seen Shell hit with a climate change claim from 100 survivors of a typhoon in the Philippines, London Stock Exchange-listed Oxford Nanopore bring legal action against its co-founder, and the editors of Pink News sue the BBC for defamation following its investigation into alleged sexual misconduct at the news site.

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Higgs Fletcher Forms White Collar, Regs Enforcement Team

By Andrea Keckley

San Diego-based law firm Higgs Fletcher & Mack LLP has launched a white collar crime and regulatory enforcement defense practice group, citing heightened regulatory scrutiny in the financial and healthcare sectors and rising enforcement risks for licensed professionals and institutions.

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Roundup

GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Michele Gorman

President Donald Trump issued an executive order to review the influence that proxy adviser firms have, and law firms saw a 9.8% increase in compensation expenses along with a similar increase in billable rates. ​These are among the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.

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Watchdog Sues White House For Records On Law Firm Deals

By Emily Sawicki

A Washington-based nonprofit watchdog has sued the Trump administration, seeking records related to deals BigLaw firms struck to provide an estimated nearly $1 billion worth of pro bono legal services to further the administration's priorities, following the president's executive orders to withhold security clearances and investigate the firms.

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Ex-NJ Municipal Court Admin Says COVID Got Her Fired

By George Woolston

The former municipal court administrator for West Windsor Township, New Jersey, has alleged that the town failed to accommodate her disability when it fired her instead of giving her a short medical leave of absence after she contracted COVID-19.

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US Atty Nominee For Wyo. Was Outside Capitol On Jan. 6

By Courtney Bublé

One of President Donald Trump's U.S. attorney nominees, who was on the U.S. Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, 2021, and recently told senators he still thinks "there were imperfections" in the 2020 election process, has been advanced toward Senate confirmation.

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Del. US Atty Resigns Citing 'Politics,' Successor Appointed

By Rose Krebs

The acting U.S. Attorney for Delaware said Friday that she is resigning, citing "a highly politicized, flawed blue-slip tradition" for nominees and saying she "fully" supports her first assistant, who has been appointed by a federal judge to succeed her.

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Bonus Spotlight

Axinn Veltrop's Bonuses Reach Up To $240K

By Andrea Keckley

Axinn Veltrop & Harkrider LLP is giving out bonuses of up to $240,000 for its associates, according to an in-house memo seen by Law360 Pulse.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Cravath Swaine & Moore LLP and Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after the Ninth Circuit handed Epic Games Inc. a partial win by mostly affirming an injunction blocking Apple Inc. from charging developers "prohibitive" commissions on iPhone app purchases made outside its systems.

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Promo that reads 2025 MVPs Promo that reads Law360 Pulse Compensation Report

LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

4 New Square

A&O Shearman

Addleshaw Goddard

Advisors LLC

Akerman LLP

Alston & Bird

Archer & Greiner

Arnold & Porter

Ashurst LLP

Axinn Veltrop

Banner Witcoff

Blackstone Chambers

Bradley Arant

Brick Court Chambers

Brownstein Hyatt

Buzbee Law Firm

Cadwalader Wickersham

Campbell & Williams

Chiesa Shahinian

Clarke Willmott

Cleary Gottlieb

Clyde & Co

Cohen Milstein

Connell Foley

Cooley LLP

Costello & Silverman

Covington & Burling

Cravath Swaine

Cripps LLP

DAC Beachcroft

DLA Piper

Debevoise & Plimpton

Dechert LLP

DiCello Levitt

Dorsey & Whitney

Epstein Becker

Faegre Drinker

Fish & Richardson

Flannery Georgalis

Foley & Lardner

Fried Frank

Gallagher Evelius

Genova Burns

Gibson Dunn

Goodwin Procter

Hagens Berman

Hall Render

Hausfeld LLP

Higgs Fletcher

Hilgers Graben

Hogan Lovells

Holland & Hart

Jackson Lewis PC

Jones Day

Katten Muchin

Kellogg Hansen

Kennedys Law LLP

Kilburn & Strode LLP

Kirkland & Ellis

Lankler Siffert

Latham & Watkins

Linklaters LLP

McDonald Carano

McNutt Law Firm

Milbank LLP

Morgan Lewis

Morrison & Foerster

Murray Osorio

Nagel Rice

Norton Rose

One Essex Court

Orrick Herrington

Osborne Clarke

PCB Byrne

Paul Weiss

Perkins Coie

Quinn Emanuel

Reed Smith

Reynolds Porter

Robinson Miller

Ropes & Gray

Rosen Law Firm PA

Rule Garza

Scott&Scott

Shegerian & Associates

Shumaker Loop

Sidley Austin

Simmons & Simmons

Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP

Skadden Arps

Slaughter and May

Spencer Fane

Stephenson Harwood

Stevens & Bolton

TLT LLP

Taft Stettinius

Thompsons Solicitors

Tousley Brain

Vinson & Elkins

Wachtell Lipton

Walker Morris LLP

Weil Gotshal

Williams & Connolly

Willkie Farr

WilmerHale

Wilsons Solicitors

Winston & Strawn

Womble Bond

Wright Close Barger & Guzman

COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

A.P. Moller-Maersk

Ace Hardware Corp.

Agri Stats Inc.

Amazon.com Inc.

Amedisys Inc.

American Antitrust Institute

American Civil Liberties Union

American Economic Liberties Project

American Industrial Partners

Apple Inc.

Arete Wealth Advisors

Balfour Beatty PLC

Bellwether Enterprise Real Estate Capital LLC

Best Buy Co. Inc.

BlackRock Inc.

Blackstone Inc.

BrightSpring Health Services

British Broadcasting Corp.

Caesars Entertainment Inc.

Cargill Inc.

Cliffwater LLC

Consumer Technology Association

Corporate Legal Operations Consortium

Delphi Automotive PLC

Digital River Inc.

Drexel University

Epic Games Inc.

Epic Systems Corp.

Exceed Company Ltd.

Express Scripts Holding Co.

FSI International, Inc.

FTI Consulting Inc.

FTI Technology LLC

Financial Services Institute Inc.

Glass Lewis & Co. LLC

Global Payments Inc.

Google LLC

HSBC Holdings PLC

Harbor Global LLC

Henkel Corp.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.

Institutional Shareholder Services Inc.

International Association of Better Business Bureaus Inc.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Juniper Networks Inc.

Known

LHC Group Inc.

Liberty Mutual Insurance Group

LinkedIn Corp.

Liverpool Victoria Friendly Society Ltd.

Lloyds Bank PLC

London Stock Exchange Group PLC

Lowe's Cos. Inc.

MiCamp Solutions LLC

Microsoft Corp.

NASCAR Digital Media LLC

Netflix Inc.

New York University

OptumRx Inc.

Paypal Holdings Inc.

Porsche

Proof

Sanderson Farms Inc.

Seattle University

Shell PLC

Skydance Media LLC

Somnigroup International Inc.

Starbucks Corp.

The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas

The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.

The Home Depot Inc.

Treasure Island LLC

Twitter Inc.

Tyson Foods Inc.

UnitedHealth Group Inc.

University of Virginia

Virgin Money Holdings PLC

Visa Inc.

Warner Bros. Discovery Inc.

Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

Washington State Bar Association

Worldpay LLC

Wynn Resorts Ltd.

Yes Bank Ltd.

Zillow Group Inc.

Zillow Home Loans LLC

easyJet plc

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

Competition Appeal Tribunal

Competition and Markets Authority

European Commission

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Federal Trade Commission

Illinois Attorney General's Office

Maryland Attorney General's Office

Minnesota Attorney General's Office

New Jersey Attorney General's Office

New York Attorney General's Office

Ofcom

Ohio Attorney General's Office

Texas Attorney General's Office

U.S. Air Force

U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Minnesota

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit

U.S. Department of Agriculture

U.S. Department of Commerce

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. District & Bankruptcy Courts of Southern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland

U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota

U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington

U.S. Office of Personnel Management

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

U.S. Supreme Court

UK High Court

United States District Court for the District of Colorado

United States District Court for the District of Wyoming