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AMP has prevailed in a hard-fought fight over where it will defend five shareholder class actions brought in the wake of the Banking Royal Commission, in a precedent-setting judgement that provides a road map for future jurisdictional battles over competing class actions.
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia is seeking to strike out portions of a shareholder class action over allegedly lax anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing controls it calls a "vague penumbra" that leaves the bank in the dark about the case against it.
Embattled financial giant AMP on Tuesday criticised concerns raised by lawyers for the federal class actions about group members' opt out rights, saying the concerns were a "red herring" in the fight against an order transferring their cases to the NSW Supreme Court.
AMP has slammed arguments that group members in four Federal Court class actions could face a jurisdictional limitation on their claims of disclosure breaches if their cases are transferred to state court, saying no such disadvantage exists.
The Federal Court offers group members in the shareholder class actions against AMP a major legal advantage over the NSW Supreme Court, lawyers for the federal cases have argued ahead of a hearing in the controversial jurisdictional battle.
Mining giant BHP Billiton has reached a $50 million deal to settle the US class action over the 2015 dam failure at the Samarco mine in Brazil.
The Full Federal Court expressed doubts Tuesday about an "unusual" and "heavy handed" order restraining lawyers leading the stayed class actions against GetSwift from advising their clients about whether to opt out of the prevailing action.
The judge overseeing the GetSwift class action proceedings was bent on picking a winner from the outset and should be removed from the case for rehearing, a barrister for one of the losing law firms told the Full Federal Court Monday.
BHP Billiton is facing the possibility of a second shareholder class action over the Fundao dam failure at its mine in Brazil, but the cases may be put on hold pending the outcome of homicide charges against company employees.
The country's biggest law firms were among the first in line to weigh in on changes to the class action regime proposed by the Australian Law Reform Commission, with one global firm cautioning against a weakening of continuous disclosure laws.