Arkansas Teacher Retirement System Reaches $642M Settlement in Pension Loss Lawsuit

“The Arkansas Teacher Retirement System on Friday unanimously approved a $642 million settlement with Allianz, the German finance company it sued for losing $774 million of its pension fund during the March 2020 market panic. The settlement amount does not include attorney’s fees and other,” reports Scott Carroll in Above The Law.

“The teachers fund filed suit in July 2020, accusing Allianz of breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty and negligence. The company had bet heavily on stock options, and it argued that the losses were the result of unprecedented market volatility at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. The teachers fund wasn’t the only.”

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Lawyers Get Ready for First-Ever Supreme Court Oral Arguments by Phone

“The Supreme Court’s announcement this week that it will hold oral arguments via teleconference for the first time in its history has a small group of America’s top attorneys prepping for the most important phone calls of their careers,” writes Tucker Higgins in CNBC’s Politics.

“The court said that it will hear 10 arguments over the first two weeks in May, including blockbuster disputes over the Electoral College and whether President Donald Trump can keep his tax records shielded from investigators. ”

“The issues are weighty, whether they are discussed in a basement office over a cell phone or inside the Supreme Court’s historical Corinthian building. But lawyers who will be arguing before the court are still adjusting.”

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Financial Tug-Of-War Emerges Over California Fire Victims’ Settlement

A financial tug-of-war is emerging over the $13.5 billion that the nation’s largest utility has agreed to pay to victims of recent California wildfires, as government agencies jockey for more than half the money to cover the costs of their response to the catastrophes, reports Insurance Journal.

Pacific Gas & Electric had acknowledged that  its power lines ignited some of the 2017-2018 fires that caused billions in damages. The company declared bankruptcy nearly a year ago as it faced about $36 billion in claims.

“Those claims were settled as part of the $13.5 billion deal that PG&E reached last month with lawyers representing uninsured and underinsured victims,” explains the Journal‘s Daisy Nguyen.

But the settlement leaves open just how much would be used to compensate victims, their lawyers and federal and state agencies for the money they spent on rescue and recovery operations.

Read the Insurance Journal report.