US Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane said he will approve a settlement with OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma in which members of the Sackler family will pay as much as $7 billion to resolve claims stemming from the opioid crisis, with the Sacklers relinquishing ownership of Purdue. The settlement supplants a prior version that the US Supreme Court struck down, ruling that Sackler family members would be improperly shielded from future opioid-related litigation.

British High Court Justice Finola O'Farrell held that Australia-based mining company BHP Group is liable in a 2015 dam failure at an iron ore mine in Brazil that sent toxic waste into the Doce River, resulting in 19 deaths and major damage to multiple villages. BHP was not the owner of the dam at the time of the disaster, but O'Farrell ruled that the collapse was the result of the company's carelessness, negligence or lack of skill. BHP has a 50% ownership stake in the mine's operator, which is a Brazilian company.

President Donald Trump is preparing significant tariff reductions and new trade agreements to address rising food prices. The administration has announced framework agreements with Argentina, Guatemala, El Salvador and Ecuador to reduce tariffs on items such as beef, bananas and coffee beans.

Pete Skandalakis, executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys' Council of Georgia, has selected himself as the new prosecutor in Georgia's election interference case against President Donald Trump and several of his allies. Skandalakis had been in charge of choosing a new prosecutor in the case after the disqualification of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. "Several prosecutors were contacted and ... each declined the appointment," Skandalakis said, adding that "it is important that someone make an informed and transparent determination about how best to proceed."

Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte referred Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., to the Justice Department based on allegations of mortgage and tax fraud. Sources said the allegations are linked to a property in the District of Columbia. Pulte has brought similar referrals that have led to an indictment of Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James and a federal investigation of Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. acting Chair Travis Hill said the agency is developing guidance for tokenized deposit insurance, an effort to help financial institutions expand their digital-asset presence. "A deposit is a deposit," Hill said at a Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia conference. "Moving a deposit from a traditional-finance world to a blockchain or distributed-ledger world shouldn't change the legal nature of it."

The Financial Accounting Standards Board's income tax disclosure rules, issued in 2023, will require public companies to provide more granular reporting of their tax payments, including the disclosure of jurisdictions that receive more than 5% of total taxes paid. Despite initial opposition from some lawmakers and concerns from multinational companies about sensitive information, the rule remains in place and is set for first-year compliance.

PLI PLUS provides access to all PLI Press publications, including this new treatise. The book provides an authoritative, yet accessible, resource for those navigating these uncharted legal waters, and it explores the intersection of AI and every branch of intellectual property, offering insights that can guide future legal reasoning, policymaking and practical decision-making.

Our practice-area webinars focus on the myriad of resources available on PLI's online research database, PLI PLUS. A PLI PLUS subscription giv