UBS AG will pay the Federal Housing Finance Agency a hefty $885 million for allegedly conning Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into buying more than $5 billion in dubious residential mortgage-backed securities.

Once again, a federal judge in Philadelphia has clipped the wings of some of the country's largest egg producers hoping to hatch their way out of multidistrict class action litigation over alleged price-fixing for eggs and egg products. And this time the judge got just a few dozen words into her decision before cracking her first chicken joke.

Cite as: MBIA Inc. v. Federal Ins. Co., 10-0355-cv (L), NYLJ 1202499327260, at *1 (2d Cir., Decided July 1, 2011)Before: Sack, Lynch, C.JJ., and Preska, Ch. D.J

With just a month left before MBIA goes to trial over its controversial 2009 restructuring, the number of financial institutions suing the troubled monoline insurer has dwindled even further. But the three banks that are left are still moving "full speed ahead" against MBIA, says Sullivan & Cromwell's Robert Giuffra Jr.

After months of cutting quiet deals with banks in the high-stakes Manhattan state court litigation challenging its 2009 restructuring, MBIA Inc. reached a major settlement with Morgan Stanley on Tuesday. But for some of MBIA's Wall Street adversaries, the notion that MBIA had to rely on a loan to fund part of the settlement vindicates their claims that the insurer's restructuring was a fraud.

There's a reason Lumish has been a hot ticket lately on the lateral market: In his first trial since joining Latham in May, the IP litigator knocked out patent claims against TransPerfect Translation International that had threatened to derail the company's business, leaving his adversaries saddled with a $1 million damages award instead.