Insurers have flooded the courts with suits against investors that play a form of poker with the Grim Reaper by purchasing life insurance policies from third parties. A pair of related decisions issued last week by the Delaware Supreme Court may help insurance companies keep such "life settlement" investors in check.

Shareholder M&A litigation is keeping a lot of lawyers awfully busy these days, especially in Delaware. But plaintiffs lawyers looking for guidance on a key provision of Delaware law related to such cases were turned away by the state's highest court this week, leaving them on the sidelines of derivative litigation over a $9 billion deal involving Freeport-McMoRan.