We don't know of any reporter as attuned to international arbitration as Am Law's Michael Goldhaber, which is why we look forward to his Arbitration Scorecard each summer. Freshfields claims pride of place as the top arbitration law firm, with an impressive 19 treaty arbitrations and an equally impressive 16 contract arbitrations.

Judges in New York just keep doling out bad news for banks caught up in litigation over mortgage-backed securities. The latest defendants to feel the sting are Deutsche Bank, Merrill Lynch, and Morgan Stanley, which learned Friday that they can't escape fraud claims in state court in Manhattan over a combined $457 million in MBS gone sour.

On Friday AT&T filed its answer to the government's antitrust suit seeking to block its acquisition of T-Mobile, and the court filing reveals a new member of AT&T's massive legal team. The document is signed by Mark Hansen of Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel. Also named on the filing are Arnold & Porter and Crowell & Moring.

In another case involving their rosy evaluations of structured investment vehicles that went bust, Moody's, S&P, and Fitch raised the First Amendment defense that has gotten them out of so many prior suits. Not this time. If you're keeping score, that makes a total of three surviving securities cases against the credit rating agencies.

In the warped bubble that is New York, even government lawyers can fall victim to the Wall Street mystique.

The former Fannie Mae GC spent seven years at Latham, but was wowed at a lunch with Paul, Weiss's litigation stars.