Smartmatic Faces FCPA Indictment In Philippine Bribery Case

By Hailey Konnath

A Florida federal grand jury on Thursday returned a superseding indictment that adds charges against Smartmatic, which wasn't previously a party to prosecutors' case accusing former executives at the voting machine company of bribing an elections official in the Philippines to secure contracts.

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Wells Fargo To Settle Investors' 'Sham' Hiring Case For $85M

By Jessica Corso

Wells Fargo & Co. has agreed to pay $85 million to exit an investor class action accusing it of conducting "sham" job interviews to meet diversity quotas, settling a yearslong dispute before it could reach trial in California federal court.

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Fla. Pension Fund Sues To Block Exxon Retail Voting Program

By Tom Lotshaw

A police pension fund in Florida hit Exxon Mobil Corp.'s directors with a proposed class action seeking to halt an allegedly unlawful, first-of-its-kind voting program that allows retail shareholders to opt to automatically support the board's recommendations.

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Musk, Twitter Investors Denied Early Wins In Fraud Suit

By Katryna Perera

Elon Musk and investors of X, formerly known as Twitter, are headed toward trial in a class action suit accusing the billionaire of intentionally tanking the social media platform's stock price, after a California federal judge denied the parties' cross-motions for an early win in the case.

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'Good Riddance': Feds Ax Big-Bank Climate Risk Guidance

By Jon Hill

Federal regulators Thursday moved to scrap a set of Biden-era "principles" that sought to ensure large banks can manage potential balance-sheet risks from climate change, an ending that one Federal Reserve official greeted with a sharp send-off.

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Justices Told Presidential Firing Limits Rely On 'Soured' Logic

By Katie Buehler

President Donald Trump and a cadre of supporters have urged the U.S. Supreme Court to wipe out what remains of a 90-year-old ruling that empowers Congress to prohibit the president from firing certain agency officials at will, arguing the decision was flawed when originally issued and is now well past its prime. 

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Ripple Pays $1B For Treasury Management Co. GTreasury

By Rae Ann Varona

Crypto exchange Ripple announced Thursday that it entered a deal to acquire treasury management systems provider GTreasury for $1 billion.

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Kalshi Tells 4th Circ. Md. Is Stepping On CFTC Oversight

By Nadia Dreid

Maryland federal judge was wrong to reject sports betting company Kalshi's argument that its so-called prediction market, which allows users to wager on the outcome of real-world events, counts as a federal derivative exchange, the company said to the Fourth Circuit.

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Semler Investor Sues For Details Of Strive Bitcoin Merger

By Emilie Ruscoe

An investor in healthcare-focused bitcoin treasury company Semler Scientific Inc. has sued to block a shareholder vote on Semler's proposed acquisition by another corporate bitcoin holder until it provides more information on the deal.

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Gabelli, Entwistle Make Lone Paramount Suit Pitch In Del.

By Jeff Montgomery

A fund of Paramount Global Inc. investor Mario Gabelli notified Delaware's Court of Chancery on Thursday that no other stockholders have sought to lead a suit challenging Paramount Global's $8.4 billion acquisition by David Ellison's Skydance Media, with the fund seeking lead plaintiff status and Entwistle & Cappucci and Farnan LLP to be lead counsel.

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Wall Street Giants Sued Over Alleged Stock Manipulation

By Emilie Ruscoe

An investor in Israeli chipmaker Eltek Ltd. has sued Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC and Interactive Brokers Group Inc., alleging they had a role in a complex stock price manipulation scheme that played out over years, causing trading prices for the tech company's shares to be "irrationally depressed."

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Peloton Moves To Toss Investors' Revived COVID-19 Suit

By Jessica Corso

Peloton has once again moved to dismiss a proposed class action lawsuit revived by the Second Circuit last month, saying that investors couldn't prove executives intentionally misled them into believing that a spike in demand during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic was sustainable.

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Fla. Judge Says Soccer CEO's Fraud Suit Belongs In UK

By Carolina Bolado

A Florida federal judge on Wednesday tossed a soccer company CEO's lawsuit alleging civil securities fraud in a deal to take his company public via a special purpose acquisition company, ruling that the dispute should be resolved in the United Kingdom.

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What Cross-Border Task Force Says About SEC's Priorities

The formation of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's cross-border task force, focused on investigating U.S. federal securities law violations overseas, underscores Chairman Paul Atkins' prioritization of classic fraud schemes, particularly involving foreign entities, say attorneys at Cleary.

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Series

Traveling Solo Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Traveling by myself has taught me to assess risk, understand tone and stay calm in high-pressure situations, which are not only useful life skills, but the foundation of how I support my clients, says Lacey Gutierrez at Group Five Legal.

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Loan Forgiveness Overhaul May Chill Legal Aid Work

By Alison Knezevich

Civil legal services groups and public defenders say the Trump administration's proposed change to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program would politicize the initiative and make it harder to recruit attorneys to jobs that pay less than the private sector.

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Atty Quits Ga. Bar's 'Facade' Committee On Client Solicitation

By Chart Riggall

A Georgia attorney resigned Friday as head of the state bar's committee on attorney-client solicitation, accusing the bar of not even "reaching for a garden hose" while unlawful solicitation of accident victims has spread "like wildfire" across the Peach State.

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

By Max Austin

This past week in London has seen Johnson & Johnson hit with a £1 billion ($1.34 billion) claim for allegedly selling contaminated baby powder, Carter-Ruck bring a claim against the Solicitors Regulation Authority, and Hewlett Packard file a probate claim against the estate of Mike Lynch.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Michele Gorman

Exxon was hit with a proposed class action alleging its new program to enable automated proxy voting for retail investors is intended to stifle shareholder dissent. Meanwhile, a new survey found that nearly two-thirds of in-house legal departments think they will rely less on outside legal service providers because of generative artificial intelligence. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.

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NY Court Orders Hearing On Counsel Conflict In Drug Case

By Elizabeth Daley

A man who pled guilty to gun and drug charges and was sentenced to 12 years in prison can argue for a new trial due to ineffective counsel after a similarly culpable co-defendant got a light sentence allegedly due to cooperation between their attorneys, a New York state appeals court said in a reversal.

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Utah Fires Motley Rice From Opioid Case

By Jack Karp

The state of Utah has fired Motley Rice LLC from representing it in long-running litigation over the opioid crisis, a spokesperson for the Utah attorney general's office confirmed to Law360 Pulse on Friday.

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Ga. Judge Resigns After DUI Arrest Outside Fla. Strip Club

By Chart Riggall

A Georgia Superior Court jurist who led the state's Council of Superior Court Judges stepped down from the bench Thursday after his driving under the influence arrest last week outside a Jacksonville, Florida, strip club.

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UC Law School Can Drop Hastings Name, Appeals Court Says

By Andrea Keckley

California is allowed to drop Serranus Clinton Hastings' name from the University of California's San Francisco-based law school, a state appeals court has ruled, backing a trial judge's decision to toss a lawsuit filed by the former chief state Supreme Court justice's descendants and various school alumni.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Kevin Penton

Caldwell Cassady & Curry PC and Miller Fair Henry PLLC lead this week's edition of Law360 Legal Lions, after a California federal jury found Samsung must pay nearly $445.5 million for infringing four wireless communication patents.

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Liberty Mutual Attys Face Sanctions Bid Over Citation Errors

By Emily Sawicki

A St. Louis federal court is weighing whether to sanction Liberty Mutual Personal Insurance Company's lawyers after they submitted a motion containing citation errors and then, after a warning, "somehow" submitted a second motion with the same types of mistakes.

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Federal Courts To Scale Back Operations Amid Shutdown

By Ryan Boysen

The federal court system has run out of money and will scale back operations beginning Monday as a result of the ongoing government shutdown, possibly leading to case delays.

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Robbins Geller To Steer REIT Investors' Suit Over $787M Deal

By Sydney Price

Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP will lead a proposed class of investors in real estate investment trust Broadmark Realty Capital Inc. who claim they were misled by executives from the REIT ahead of a $787 million merger with Ready Capital Corp. in 2023.

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