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: 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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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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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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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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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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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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Bonus Spotlight

Pallas Offers Up To $232K In Bonuses To Top US, UK Lawyers

By Tracey Read

Litigation boutique Pallas Partners announced Thursday that it is offering high-performing senior U.S. and U.K. associates and counsel as much as $232,000 in bonuses this year.

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'Totally Unacceptable': Alsup Rips Feds In Student Loan Deal

By Bonnie Eslinger

U.S. District Judge William Alsup on Thursday denied the U.S. Department of Education's request for an 18-month extension to process over 200,000 loan cancellation applications for students claiming they were defrauded by colleges they attended, calling it "totally unacceptable" and setting an April deadline to get the job done.

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White House Pushes Halligan's Confirmation Despite Hurdles

By Courtney Bublé

The White House is forging ahead with its bid to win confirmation of the president's controversial pick for U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia after a federal judge ruled she was serving illegally on an interim basis.

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Grassley Urges White House To Step It Up On Noms

By Courtney Bublé

Sen. Chuck Grassley, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had a message for the White House Thursday: "Get on the ball" with nominations for U.S. attorneys and the judiciary.

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NJ Sens. Urge Cooperation On Next NJ US Attorney Nom

By Courtney Bublé

The New Jersey senators are looking to collaborate with the White House to find a new nominee for U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey after the president's initial pick failed.

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DC Firm Faces Proposed Class Action Over Data Breach

By Andrea Keckley

A Washington, D.C., law firm failed to notify clients of a data breach that compromised their personal information for six months, a proposed class action alleged in federal court on Wednesday.

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Trump Orders Review Of Proxy Advisers' 'Substantial Power'

By Rae Ann Varona

President Donald Trump on Thursday issued an executive order that aims to scrutinize the influence that proxy adviser firms like Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. and Glass Lewis & Co. LLC have, including in relation to diversity, equity and inclusion agendas.

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Feds Reportedly Fail To Reindict NY AG Letitia James, Again

By Lauren Berg

New York Attorney General Letitia James' attorney Thursday celebrated reports that another Virginia federal grand jury declined to reindict her on charges of mortgage fraud, the second jury in a week to reject a case President Donald Trump had pushed prosecutors to pursue against a political opponent he's called "guilty as hell."

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Grants Can Be Axed For Political Reasons, DOJ Atty Says

By Jared Foretek

A Trump administration lawyer said Thursday that the president had blanket authority to cancel every discretionary grant slated for states that broke against him in the general election, and it wouldn't amount to a violation of the Fifth Amendment's equal protection guarantee.

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10th Circ. Reveals Judge Contacted Ex-Atty In 'Tiger King' Case

By Ivan Moreno

A Tenth Circuit panel considering a copyright infringement claim against Netflix over a video clip in its popular "Tiger King" docuseries has requested the parties' input on whether a judge on the panel should recuse himself after inadvertently contacting a former attorney of the plaintiff last month on an unrelated legal matter.

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Tracking Challenges To USPTO's Discretion Policy

By Dani Kass

Leaders at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office have significantly altered the Patent Trial and Appeal Board playing field since March, making changes to institution reviews that have led to unprecedented levels of petition denials. A steady stream of companies has challenged those changes through mandamus petitions to the Federal Circuit, and here Law360 tracks where those petitions stand.

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SEC Must Provide Names To Compliance Chief In Fraud Suit

By Katryna Perera

An Illinois federal judge on Thursday ordered the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to comply with a chief compliance officer's request for the names of agency staffers familiar with his whistleblower claims as he defends allegations that he played a role in a purportedly fraudulent stock offering by a "sham" energy company.

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