U.S. District Judge Denny Chin has given Google Inc. (GOOG), the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers until Nov 9 to submit a fresh proposal to address the concerns put forward by the Justice Department.   The original agreement for $125 million was announced in October last year in response to separate lawsuits filed by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers.   The Justice Department has said that the agreement raises legal concerns with respect to antitrust law, reduces competition among publishers (if Google gets exclusive rights) and opens the door to price escalation as a result of Google’s monopoly.   The Judge did not set a deadline for objections after the new agreement was tendered. However, he stated that only objections related to the changes made in the new agreement would be considered, as the previous agreement had already been considered and ...

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will aggressively pursue a trial against Bank of America Corp. (BAC) for allegedly misleading investors during the acquisition of Merrill Lynch & Co. late last year. The SEC accused BofA of failing to disclose to shareholders that it had authorized Merrill to pay up to $5.8 billion in bonuses to employees in 2008 even after it lost $27.6 billion that year.

Last month, the SEC and BofA had reached a settlement on the charges that required the bank to pay a $33 million fine. But US District Judge Jed Rakoff condemned the deal, saying the corporate fine would further unfairly penalize the shareholders instead of the people actually guilty of misleading investors.

Both the SEC and BofA have defended the earlier settlement proposal as appropriate. But after Rakoff's ruling, the SEC weighed its options - to go to trial, drop the

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Last week, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in St. Louis said that Allstate Corp. (ALL) had agreed to pay $4.5 million to certain former employees to settle an age-discrimination lawsuit.

A reorganization of the company in 1999 had turned thousands of Allstate agents from employees to independent contractors. However, 1-year hiring moratorium was then put to effect. The EEOC claimed that 90% of the agents subjected to the moratorium were aged 40 or more and were disproportionately affected.

While the older workers were looking to be rehired in a different role within the company, Allstate decided not to rehire sales agents within a year of termination of their employment, or longer if they were still receiving severance benefits. The company stopped hiring new sales agents as employees in 1990 and shifted towards using external contractors.

The lawsuit was filed in October 2004 under the Age Discrimination in

...

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – September 14, 2009 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Citigroup Inc. (C), UBS AG (UBS), Credit Suisse Group AG (CS), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) and Bank of America Corporation (BAC).

Get the most recent insight from Zacks Equity Research with the free Profit from the Pros newsletter: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5513

Here are highlights from Friday’s Analyst Blog:

Citgroup Wins Lawsuit Dismissal

Citigroup Inc.’s (C) officers and directors (including Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit) won the dismissal of a lawsuit claiming they breached their duty to the bank by manipulating the market for auction-rate securities (ARS).

On Sep 10,

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Citigroup Inc.’s (C) officers and directors (including Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit) won the dismissal of a lawsuit claiming they breached their duty to the bank by manipulating the market for auction-rate securities (ARS). On Sep 10, U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain in New York dismissed the derivative lawsuit on procedural grounds because the plaintiffs failed to ask the bank to bring the case itself. She gave the plaintiffs an opportunity to file a new complaint. In a derivative lawsuit, shareholders seek to recover damages from the company instead of being paid to individual shareholders. Damages would be sought from executives or board members. The judge's written ruling said the pension fund could file an amended complaint by Oct 1, but failure to do so would result in a judgment dismissing the complaint. Plaintiffs led by the Louisiana ...

The bankruptcies of Chrysler Group LLC and General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GRM) provided Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE ADR: TM) with an unparalleled opportunity to increase U.S. market share. But now patent-infringement claims could result in a U.S. import ban on some of the company’s most popular hybrid cars.

McLean, Virginia-based Paice LLC has filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) that claims the Toyota Camry infringes on its patents, Bloomberg News reported. An investigation into the claim could be completed within 15 months and result in a ban of some Toyota imports.

Paice, a developer of hybrid electric power train technology, in 2005 won a similar case against Toyota involving the Japanese carmaker’s Prius, Highlander and Lexus RX400h hybrid models. Paice claimed those vehicles used its drivetrain technologies, and a jury agreed, awarding the company $4.3 million

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Mattel Inc. (MAT) has been accused of manipulating the MGA probe. MGA Entertainment claims Mattel tried to influence the Canadian police while they were investigating a trade secrets theft complaint brought against it by Mattel. The U.S. District Judge has ordered Mattel’s Chief Security, Richard De Anda, to appear at a hearing on September 21, 2009. This hearing will address the MGA charge. Mattel had allegedly sent gifts to the law enforcement officials. Mattel succeeded in obtaining the rights of MGA’s Bratz doll last year after the jury found that the Bratz concept was sold to MGA by a former doll designer of Mattel during his contract tenure at Mattel. MGA has also accused Mattel of copying Bratz with its Flavas and MyScene Barbie dolls and for other unfair business practices in an another lawsuit, of which a trial is scheduled for next year....

Negative news flow continues for the U.S credit rating agencies, as a U.S. federal judge rejected the appeal by Morgan Stanley (MS), Moody’s Corporation (MCO) and McGraw-Hill's (MHP) Standard & Poor’s to dismiss the fraud charges brought against them for not disclosing the risks associated with an investment related to subprime mortgages. This fraud claim was brought against the defendants by Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and King County in Washington State. However, U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin dismissed all claims brought against a fourth defendant, Bank of New York Mellon Corp. We believe this ruling could adversely affect the prospects of these credit rating agencies as it might strengthen other pending cases against them. Recently, the rating agencies have been in the news for providing inaccurate information about some securities to certain clients. After that, the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), the market watchdog, ...

 

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Atlas Oil and Gas, Inc. (OTCBB:AOLG), which focuses on the potential for major exploration and production reclamation projects in the oil and gas sector, today received approval from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) to change its corporate name to Cheyenne Resources Corp., and its trading symbol to CYRS on the

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U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff in Manhattan ordered federal regulators to explain why they didn't investigate whether executives at Bank of America Corp. (BAC) misled shareholders about bonuses paid by Merrill Lynch.   Rakoff delayed the approval of Bank of America's proposed $33 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over the bonus affair, which arose after the bank’s acquisition of Merrill Lynch in September 2008 for $50 billion.   The SEC charged that a proxy statement by Bank of America in November misled investors as it stated that Merrill Lynch would not pay year-end bonuses without Bank of America's consent. However, Bank of America had already authorized Merrill Lynch to pay up to $5.8 billion in bonuses and didn't share that information with shareholders. That rendered a statement Bank of America mailed to 283,000 shareholders of both companies about the Merrill Lynch deal materially false ...