Commercial, Corporate, and Contracts

Subscribe to Commercial, Corporate, and Contracts
We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

Welcome back to Commercial Roundup–the best source for the latest appellate decisions on issues that matter in commercial litigation. In this issue, you’ll find four Supreme Court rulings on overseas torts, patent enablement, the reach of the False Claims Act, and limits on the Securities Act of 1933 as well as opinions on a range of topics from all but two of the 13 federal Courts of Appeals and the Supreme Court of Texas. Have a terrific weekend–and don’t forget to subscribe so you’ll get future issues without having to look for them.…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – June 2, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

The last week brought losses for antitrust enforcers (“Apple’s concerns over app security” and “Laches and Trinko kill”), for a man who sued to get “co-inventor” status (“Adding option to patent”), for distributors invoking franchise-law protections (“State franchise statute didn’t apply”), for plaintiffs wishing to toll limitations under an 1841 statute (“Defendant’s ‘absence from state”), for some contract deadline enforcers (“Time ‘from’ or ‘after’”), and for some avoiders of collateral estoppel (“Ruling on question of issue preclusion”).

Have a terrific week–Commercial Roundup will see you again next Wednesday morning.

Barry Barnett…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – May 3, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

Commercial Roundup offers a double feature this week–two weeks in one.

We lead off with a memory (“The biggest surprise?”), proceed through a slew of IP rulings, pause on my colleagues’ big win against Fox News (“All it took”), note the Supreme Court has cleared the way for constitutional attacks on the SEC and FTC (“How about now?”) and the Fifth Circuit almost immediately expedited one such attack (“Fifth Circuit looks anxious”), and highlight rulings on choice of law clauses and class certification before ending on a high note (“Need a lift”).

Have a terrific rest of the week.…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – April 27, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

Welcome to this week’s Commercial Roundup—in which you’ll find links to the most significant rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court and the 13 Courts of Appeals plus the highest courts in Delaware, New York, and Texas. You’ll also see other matters of interest to commercial trial lawyers and the firms and business people they represent.

This week a couple of Latin phrases we learned in the first year of law school headline the list. The first—res ipsa loquitur—means something like “the thing (res) speaks (loquitur) for itself (ipsa)” and provides a shortcut for a party wishing to prove a claim of negligence. The other Latin phrase—forum non conveniens—suggests the plaintiff brought a case in a place (forum) whose remoteness to the parties, witnesses, and sources of proof and lack of expertise in governing law (among other factors) render it sufficiently inconvenient (non conveniens) as to justify dismissing the case in favor of, or transferring it to, a much more convenient forum.

We also have an important First Circuit ruling on a pair of issues that arise often in efforts to enforce arbitration clauses and confirm awards, a “tacking” question regarding priority of trademarks, and decisions on when limitations starts to run in securities fraud cases, insurance coverage for COVID-19 losses, damages remedy for fraudulent transfer, and when prior art “anticipates” a claim limitation without mentioning it.

So here we go—Commercial Roundup for the week of April 5-12.…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – April 12, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

This week’s Commercial Roundup follows three days of all antitrust, all the time at the ABA Antitrust Law Section’s annual Spring Meeting in our nation’s capital. More than 3,700 government enforcers, private lawyers, judges, economists, econometricians, academics, students, and others assembled to talk about the recent past and future of antitrust in the U.S. and around the world.

The Roundup includes but one post about the Spring Meeting—BIG meets ABA—but it will give you a good sense of the combat that flickered into view amid the nerdy bonhomie. You can find other posts on the Spring Meeting here, here, and here.

Now, let’s get to the Roundup!…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – April 5, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

Welcome to the spring break edition of Commercial Roundup. This week’s highlights include a fantastic round-robin interview of six women lawyers who’ve made their way to the top of antitrust-world and the end of a saga about a non-lawyer who helped mass-tort firms “sign up clients” for money.

This week you’ll find me at the Spring Meeting of the ABA’s Antitrust Law Section in Washington, DC. Send me an email (bbarnett@susmangodfrey.com) if you’ve also come to the this year’s antitrust nerd-fest and either see an especially recondite, funny, or otherwise notable presentation or would like to say hello.

Barry Barnett

…
Continue Reading Commercial Roundup – March 29, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

Welcome to this week’s Commercial Roundup.

Below you will find headlines and links to appellate decisions and other items of particular interest to business people and lawyers dealing with complex disputes.

If you haven’t already subscribed to The Contingency, I invite you to do it now. Just enter your email address in the box to the right, hit the return button, and click the “Yes, subscribe me to this list” rectangle in the confirmation email you’ll receive.

Now let’s get to the Roundup!

Barry…

Continue Reading Commercial Roundup–March 23, 2023

We round up the most significant appellate decisions relevant to commercial litigation each week.

To celebrate the arrival of summer, I am trying an experiment.

In this post–which covers almost all of June–I’ve sorted commercial rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Courts of Appeals, and a selection from the highest state courts according to subject matter.

The resulting headings group decisions by broadly descriptive categories (e.g., Antitrust and Intellectual Property) for quicker reference. As usual, you may access the decisions by clicking on the case summary itself.

Please let me know you find these signposts worthwhile.
Continue Reading Commercial Roundup