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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Disney Cuts $1B OpenAI Licensing Deal Amid Google IP Clash

By Dorothy Atkins

The Walt Disney Co. has cut a $1 billion investment deal with OpenAI to become OpenAI's first major content licensing partner on its generative AI video-platform Sora, the companies announced Thursday, a day after Disney sent Google a cease-and-desist letter accusing Google's AI tools of "massive infringement."

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Terraform Founder Gets 15 Years For 'Epic' $40B Crypto Scam

By Pete Brush

A Manhattan federal judge hit Terraform founder Do Kwon with a 15-year prison sentence Thursday, saying he caused "real people to lose $40 billion in real money" as he orchestrated a massive fraud that sunk the once high-flying crypto concern.

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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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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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NLRB Judge Tosses Case Against 'Memphis 7' Starbucks

By Hailey Konnath

An administrative law judge has determined that Starbucks didn't violate the National Labor Relations Act when it surveilled employees' union activities, more strictly enforced its punctuality policy and disciplined a union employee at a store that illegally fired seven activists in 2022.

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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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Trump Executive Order Targets 'Excessive' State AI Laws

By Hailey Konnath

President Donald Trump on Thursday signed a controversial executive order establishing a "minimally burdensome national standard" for regulating artificial intelligence, deeming the order necessary for the United States to remain a leader in AI amid "excessive" state regulation.

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House Passes Bill To Rev Up Investment, Biz Opportunities

By Lauren Berg

The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday passed bipartisan legislation that would revamp securities law by making it easier for entrepreneurs and small businesses to access capital and by expanding investment opportunities in private markets.

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House Panel Advances Nearly 20 Bills To Protect Kids Online

By Allison Grande

A package of 18 bills that propose using methods such age verification mandates, government-run studies and educational campaigns to enhance online safeguards for children passed through a House subcommittee Thursday, despite concerns from Democrats that the measures wouldn't be enough to counter recent moves to reduce the roles of states and the Federal Trade Commission in this space. 

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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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OpenAI, Microsoft Sued Over Mother's Murder By Son

By Y. Peter Kang

A wrongful death suit accusing OpenAI's artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT of causing the murder-suicide of a mother and son was filed Thursday in California state court, with additional allegations that equity stakeholder Microsoft approved an unsafe, updated version of the chatbot.

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DoorDash, Uber Sue NYC To Block Checkout Tip Prompt Law

By Rae Ann Varona

DoorDash and Uber Eats filed suit together Thursday in Manhattan federal court, seeking to block two New York City laws that the food delivery companies say force them to solicit tips before or as customers check out, in an alleged violation of the companies' constitutional rights.

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Ex-Abercrombie CEO Headed For Competency Hearing

By Cara Salvatore

A New York federal judge said Thursday she will hold a competency hearing for former Abercrombie & Fitch Co. CEO Michael Jeffries to see whether he can stand trial on sex trafficking charges, following recent findings that he's overcome his earlier incompetency.

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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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Co. Seeks Clawback From Boeing After Doc-Sharing Accident

By Ganesh Setty

A company accusing Boeing of technology theft in space projects told a Washington federal court it should be allowed to claw back hundreds of privileged documents after inadvertently sharing them, adding that Boeing didn't confer with it in good faith.

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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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Chancery Skeptical Of B. Riley Investors' Investment Loss Suit

By Jarek Rutz

A vice chancellor in the Delaware Chancery Court on Thursday pressed the lawyer for a B. Riley Financial Inc. stockholder to justify Caremark oversight claims tied to the investment firm's failed bets on the Franchise Group Inc., repeatedly questioning whether the complaint plausibly alleged bad faith board inaction rather than business judgment disagreements.


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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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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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Elevance Health Adds Former Pfizer GC To Its Board

By Christine DeRosa

Insurer Elevance Health has appointed former Pfizer Inc. general counsel Amy Schulman, currently a managing partner of Polaris Partners, to serve on its board of directors.

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Longtime Aon Leader Takes GC Spot At Howden US

By Madison Arnold

Global insurance group Howden has appointed a longtime leader at professional services firm Aon to the role of general counsel for Howden's U.S. retail broking and advisory business.

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How New SEC Policies Shift Shareholder Proposal Landscape

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Paul Atkins' recent remarks provide a road map for public companies to exclude nonbinding shareholder proposals from proxy materials, which would disrupt the mechanism that has traditionally defined how shareholders and companies engage on governance matters, say attorneys at Gunderson.

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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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Key Crypto Class Action Trends And Rulings In 2025

As the law continued to take shape in the growing area of crypto-assets, this year saw a jump in crypto class action litigation, including noteworthy decisions on motions to compel arbitration and class certification, according to Justin Donoho at Duane Morris.

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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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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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