Want to get this daily news briefing by email? Here's the sign-up.

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

(AD)VANTAGE POINT - With Q4 underway, consultants and firm leaders are painting a picture of a mixed-deal environment that might depend, to some extent, on the size of the firm, Law.com's Andrew Maloney reports. Recent ALM survey data shows smaller firms to be more optimistic about the balance of 2023, while larger firms are more bullish about next year than their counterparts outside the Am Law 200. "What I'm hearing from firms is while they are cautiously optimistic, they're almost just looking into 2024 and planning for that, because a lot of their clients aren't doing any deals right now," said Heather McCullough, partner and co-founder of professional services counseling firm Society54. "While they may have aspirations to do something, they're just on hold for the foreseeable future."

WORK ON COMMISSION -  Last week was a particularly aggressive one for the SEC in terms of enforcement actions against broker-dealers, corporate insiders and others. Overall in September, the SEC announced settlements or charges in more than three dozen matters, and about 20 of those were in the last week. And while that's bad for those broker-dealers, corporate insides (and others), it's working out quite swimmingly for Big Law and boutiques, who have, as Law.com's Abigail Adcox reports, seen a bonanza of work lately.

ON THE RADAR - R. Leland Evans and Scott A. Fenton of Dickie, McCamey & Chilcote and Michael G. Bongiorno and Tamar Kaplan-Marans of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr have entered appearances for Norfolk Southern and its top executives in a pending securities class action. The suit, which focuses on a Feb. 3 train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, was filed Sept. 9 in Georgia Northern District Court by Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd and Murray Murphy Moul & Basil. The suit accuses the defendants of filing false public reports about the safety and efficiency of Norfolk's operations. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Steven D. Grimberg, is 1:23-cv-04175, Bucks County Employees Retirement System v. Norfolk Southern Corporation et al. Stay up on the latest state and federal litigation, as well as the latest corporate deals, with Law.com Radar.  

EDITOR'S PICKS