Industrial conglomerate Honeywell, advised by Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP, on Thursday unveiled plans to fully separate its automation and aerospace technology businesses, which when paired with the company's previously announced plan to spin off its advanced materials business, will result in three separate publicly traded companies.
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TOP NEWS

Honeywell To Split Into 3 Entities After Activist Pressure

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

Industrial conglomerate Honeywell, advised by Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP, on Thursday unveiled plans to fully separate its automation and aerospace technology businesses, which when paired with the company's previously announced plan to spin off its advanced materials business, will result in three separate publicly traded companies.

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Goodwin, Ropes Lead Cystic Fibrosis Co.'s Upsized $191M IPO

By Tom Zanki

Cystic fibrosis-focused drug developer Sionna Therapeutics Inc. on Thursday priced an upsized $191 million initial public offering at the top of its range, represented by Goodwin Procter LLP and underwriters counsel Ropes & Gray LLP.

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Deals Rumor Mill

Meta Eyes Texas Skies, Another Crypto IPO, And More Rumors

By Tom Zanki

Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc. is considering relocating its legal residence to Texas, while cryptocurrency exchange Bullish is moving forward on an initial public offering, and Unilever PLC is eyeing New York as a listing destination for its ice cream business.

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Law360 Seeks Members For Its 2025 Editorial Boards

Law360 is looking for avid readers of our publications to serve as members of our 2025 editorial advisory boards.

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POLICY & REGULATION

CFTC Signals Openness To Regulate Sports Event Contracts

By Alex Lawson

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced a public roundtable to discuss its regulation of contracts tied to high-profile sporting events Wednesday, with the acting chair bemoaning the commission's current policy as a "sinkhole of legal uncertainty."

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House GOP Floats Stablecoin Bill Amid Debanking Buzz

By Aislinn Keely

House Financial Services lawmakers unveiled a discussion draft of a bill to regulate stablecoins Thursday evening, joining a separate effort introduced in the U.S. Senate earlier this week.

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EQUITY

4th Circ. Sides With Credit Rater In Developers' Libel Lawsuit

By Hayley Fowler

A group of developers won't get a second shot at their libel suit alleging credit rating firm Dun & Bradstreet published misleading credit reports about them after the Fourth Circuit said they failed to show the statements in those reports were defamatory.

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PEOPLE

SEC Assistant Chief Litigation Counsel Joins Carlton Fields

By Katryna Perera

An assistant chief litigation counsel for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has left the agency to join Carlton Fields as a shareholder in the firm's securities litigation and enforcement practice in Washington, D.C., the firm announced Thursday.

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EXPERT ANALYSIS

Expect Scrutiny Of Banks To Persist, Even Under Trump

Although the change in administrations brings some measure of uncertainty as to the nature of bank compliance oversight, if regulators in Washington, D.C., attempt to dilute the vigilance of federal superintendence, the states are waiting in the wings to fill the void, say attorneys at Polsinelli.

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AI Will Soon Transform The E-Discovery Industrial Complex

Todd Itami at Covington discusses how generative artificial intelligence will reshape the current e-discovery paradigm, replacing the blunt instrument of data handling with a laser scalpel of fully integrated enterprise solutions — after first making e-discovery processes technically and legally harder.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

BigLaw Firms Saw Double-Digit Profit Growth In 2024

By Aebra Coe

Last year was "one of the strongest years on record" for U.S. law firm financial results, according to Citi Global Wealth at Work Law Firm Group head Gretta Rusanow, with a survey by the bank of mostly large law firms showing a 16.6% increase in profits and a 12.3% increase in revenue over 2023.

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Legal Sector Gains 900 Jobs In January Amid Data Revisions

By Xiumei Dong

The U.S. legal sector started the year with a modest boost, adding 900 jobs in January, according to preliminary data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released Friday following the agency's annual employment data revision that also lifted earlier job figures from the past year. 

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Dentons US Names Capital Markets Leader Managing Partner

By Anna Sanders

Dentons tapped capital markets partner and regulatory team leader John Holahan to serve as U.S. managing partner, the firm announced Friday.

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Injury Attys In Hot Water Over Possible AI-Hallucinated Cites

By Lauren Berg

Morgan & Morgan PA and the Goody Law Group on Friday withdrew pretrial motions in a personal injury lawsuit against Walmart over an allegedly defective hoverboard after a Florida federal court ordered the firms to explain why the filings contained what appears to be case law hallucinated by generative artificial intelligence.

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Plaintiffs Lawyers Swarm Los Angeles Post-Fires

By Brandon Lowrey

A deadly wildfire may be among the first covered by a new state fund that reimburses at-fault utility companies. This could mean billions of dollars for plaintiffs lawyers, and, if past fires are any indication, frustration and confusion for some victims.

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4th Circ. Says LeClairRyan Founder May Duck Tax Liability

By Jack Karp

Defunct law firm LeClairRyan PLLC's operating agreement did not bar founder Gary LeClair from jumping ship in time to potentially dodge massive tax bills tied to the firm's collapse, the Fourth Circuit ruled Friday.

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Goldstein's Pro Se Filing Irks Feds Amid Murky Atty Situation

By Elliot Weld

Prosecutors have asked a Maryland federal judge to strike a pro se motion from Tom Goldstein in his tax evasion case, saying the U.S. Supreme Court attorney and SCOTUSblog publisher shouldn't be allowed to personally make arguments to the court when he is represented by several experienced lawyers.

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2nd Circ. Orders In-House Counsel Docs In Grand Jury Case

By Parker Quinlan

The Second Circuit on Friday ruled that an in-house attorney for a publicly traded company under federal investigation in New York must turn over communications as part of a grand jury investigation under the crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege.

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Analysis

Del.'s Quiet Ambition To Tweak Chancery, Stem Feared DExit

By Jeff Montgomery

Anxious over claims that stockholder-tilted decisions by Delaware's Court of Chancery will trigger more companies to follow Tesla, SpaceX, Meta and Dropbox to other states, Delaware policymakers are taking a hard look at the venerable business court's processes, hoping to slow a feared rush to DExit.

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DC Prosecutor Axed Jan. 6 Case Against Client, Group Says

By Lauren Berg

A legal group filed a bar complaint in Missouri Thursday against President Donald Trump's top prosecutor in Washington, D.C., saying the attorney violated rules of professional conduct when, in his new government role, he moved to dismiss charges related to the U.S. Capitol attack against his own client.

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Law360's Legal Lions Of The Week

By Aebra Coe and Kevin Penton

Lawyers from Latham & Watkins LLP and Proskauer Rose LLP kick off this week's Law360 Legal Lions, with a jury decision ending a $500 million antitrust lawsuit against their clients, U.S. Soccer and Major League Soccer.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

General counsel will be scrutinizing their companies' DEI policies after U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the U.S. Department of Justice to probe and penalize illegal diversity policies in the private and public sectors. Outside the DOJ, legal professionals, including in-house attorneys, reported high job satisfaction in a recent survey, likely leading to lower turnover. These are some of the stories in corporate legal news you may have missed in the past week.​

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

By Laura Stewart Liberty

This past week in London has seen Investec Bank PLC sue two diamond tycoons, London florist Nikki Tibbles file a claim against an "imitator company," a direct descendant of the Cartier family launch a claim, and a Coronation Street actor hit footballer Joe Bunney with a defamation claim. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.

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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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Promo that reads 2024 Practice Groups of the Year Promo that reads Law360 Pulse In-House Counsel Satisfaction Survey

LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

Addleshaw Goddard

Ballard Spahr

Bernstein Litowitz

Bird & Bird

Bivonas Law LLP

Brooks Pierce

Bryan Cave

Cahill Gordon

Carlton Fields

Carpmaels & Ransford

Clyde & Co

Continental PLLC

Covington & Burling

Crowley Fleck

DLA Piper

Dentons

Fieldfisher

Fox Williams

Gentry Locke

Gibson Dunn

Goodwin Procter

Goody Law Group

Guerra LLP

Guttman Buschner

Herbert Smith Freehills

Hicks Johnson

Hill Dickinson

Holland & Knight

Hueston Hennigan

Irwin Mitchell

Jones Day

Keoghs LLP

Kirkland & Ellis

Latham & Watkins

Lauro & Singer

Lerch Early

Lewis Silkin

McCoy Leavitt

Morgan & Morgan

Morgan Lewis

Morvillo Abramowitz

Munger Tolles

Murphy Anderson PLLC

Offit Kurman

Orrick Herrington

Paul Weiss

Penningtons Manches

Polsinelli PC

Proskauer Rose

Quinn Emanuel

RBG Legal Services Ltd.

RWK Goodman

Reed Smith

Reynolds Porter

Ropes & Gray

Sheppard Mullin

Sidley Austin

Simmons & Simmons

Skadden Arps

Stevens & Bolton

Tavenner & Beran PLC

Theodora Oringher

Umberg & Zipser

Walker Morris LLP

Willenken LLP

WilmerHale

Withersworldwide

COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

AbbVie Inc.

AccuWeather Inc.

American Airlines Group Inc.

American Bar Association

American Federation of Government Employees

American Federation of State County & Municipal Employees

Argo Group International Holdings Ltd.

Atlas Venture LP

Atos SE

Barclays PLC

Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc.

Beta Bionics Inc.

Bibby Financial Services Ltd.

Block.one LLC

Bloomberg LP

Blue Cross Blue Shield Association

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co.

California Earthquake Authority

Canon Inc.

Cartier SA

CoinDesk LLC

Coinbase Global Inc.

Credit Suisse Group AG

Databricks Inc.

Democracy Forward Foundation

Digital Currency Group Inc.

Dun & Bradstreet Corp.

Elliott Investment Management LP

Exxon Mobil Corp.

Fordham University

George Washington University

Globant SA

Google LLC

Guggenheim Partners LLC

Hatch Henderson Fivel LLC

Howden Broking Group Ltd.

IDEX Corp.

Instagram Inc.

Investec PLC

Jefferies Financial Group Inc.

Jetson Electric Bikes LLC

LexisNexis Legal & Professional

LinkedIn Corp.

London Stock Exchange Group PLC

Longford Capital Management LP

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power

MGA Entertainment Inc.

Major League Soccer LLC

Major Lindsey & Africa LLC

McKinsey & Co. Inc.

Mediterranean Shipping Co. SA

Meta Platforms Inc.

Michigan State University

Moelis & Co.

NASDAQ Inc.

NICE Ltd.

NICE inContact

National Association of Government Employees

Netflix Inc.

Neurocrine Biosciences Inc.

New York Law School

PG&E Corp.

Palantir Technologies Inc.

Pershing Square Capital Management LP

Public Citizen Inc.

Purdue Pharma LP

RELX PLC

Robert Half Inc.

Rutter's Holdings Inc.

SoftBank Group Corp.

Southern California Edison Co.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp.

State Bar of California

Station Casinos LLC

Stifel Financial Corp.

TD Securities Inc.

TPG Growth

TUI AG

Tempur Sealy International Inc.

Tesla Inc.

The Florida Bar

The Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

The PNC Financial Services Group Inc.

Therapeutics Inc.

Toyota Motor Corp.

TripAdvisor Inc.

Unilever PLC

United Policyholders

UnitedLex Corp.

University of Virginia

Walmart Inc.

Wells Fargo & Co.

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

Australian Securities and Investments Commission

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Commodity Futures Trading Commission

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

Delaware Court of Chancery

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

Federal Communications Commission

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Federal Reserve System

Federal Trade Commission

Financial Conduct Authority

Information Commissioner's Office

National Labor Relations Board

New York Attorney General's Office

Office of Foreign Assets Control

Office of the Comptroller of the Currency

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

U.S. Army

U.S. Attorney's Office

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

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

U.S. Department of Commerce

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. Department of Labor

U.S. Department of the Treasury

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland

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

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission

U.S. Senate

U.S. Supreme Court

UK High Court

United States District Court for the District of Wyoming