New York AI law firm Crosby has secured a US$5m malpractice policy from Testudo for its AI agents, believed to be a first. The agents now handle ~20% of the firm’s work, mostly paralegal tasks, with no lawyer sign-off. Founder Ryan Daniels expects regulators to let agents do proper legal work within two years: Point Blank

⚖️ Employment: The Federal Court has stopped former Telstra executive John Ieraci from working at rival Vocus until 1 January 2027, when his six-month restraint ends. Telstra made Ieraci redundant in July after nearly 20 years, and he started at Vocus as a managing director in October. Ieraci promised not to use Telstra’s confidential information and to stay out of certain work, but Snaden J said those promises weren’t enough. Ieraci can’t “unpossess” what he knows, and it’s unrealistic to expect him to keep it out of his decisions at Vocus. Telstra must keep paying him until then: The Federal Court

⚖️ Property/Contract: In an off-the-plan contract, “cannot” means practically unable, not literally impossible, says the Queensland Court of Appeal. Developer CAV Gasworks agreed in 2017 to sell two apartments for $4.2m. Either party could terminate if the developer “cannot” give a 14-day settlement notice within 5.5 years. Titles issued before that deadline, but the apartments weren’t finished, so the developer terminated and resold them. The trial judge read “cannot” as impossible and, because titles had issued, held the developer could have given notice, so the termination was invalid. She awarded the buyer $6.1m. In a 2-1 split, the Court reversed, holding no sensible developer would trigger settlement on an unfinished unit: Queensland Court of Appeal

⚖️ Takeovers: The Takeovers Panel has ordered A2MP Investments to correct the record on its off-market takeover bid for Canyon Resources, even though the bid lapsed in September. The Panel found A2MP’s bidder’s statement didn’t properly disclose its plans or funding for Canyon, A2MP relied on Canyon’s confidential information in valuing the bid, and an offer priced well below Canyon’s trading price risked pressuring shareholders to accept. A2MP must now publish a Panel-approved correction on the ASX covering its plans for Canyon’s bauxite, why it changed Canyon’s feasibility study assumptions, and how Canyon’s information shaped its valuation: Takeovers Panel

AI companies are about to answer to someone. Albo’s new AI regulator will enforce six mandatory guardrails, including independent testing of new models, fast reporting of cyber incidents and published security frameworks. Since OpenAI’s breach of government websites apparently broke no laws, new criminal offences are also on the table: Capital Brief

Your pay is worth what it was in 2011. Real wages have fallen almost 5.5% since March 2021, with prices rising faster than pay. Deloitte’s Stephen Smith doesn’t expect them to recover until 2034. With the RBA hiking for a fifth time this year, Labor’s primary vote has slipped to 26%: AFR

📄 Anthropic has lodged its Australian prospectus, targeting a US$1.02tn valuation (US$1.4tn fully diluted) and a raise of up to US$64.4bn at US$70 to US$78 a share. CommSec, Macquarie and Morgans are among eight local brokers selling to retail ahead of the 20 November Nasdaq debut: AFR, Capital Brief

🏘️ AVID Property Group has matched Warburg Pincus’ improved $5.60-a-share bid for Ingenia Communities, keeping its process deed with the lifestyle communities operator “on foot”. It’s AVID’s second match. Its earlier $5.45 offer was deemed “equal or superior” to Warburg’s bid of the same value: ASX

🛍️ David Jones won’t learn its fate for months, with administrators McGrathNicol seeking a three-month delay to the second creditors’ meeting (usually held within six weeks) while they hunt for a buyer or recapitalisation: Bloomberg

Wholesale power prices are tipped to nearly double from $60/MWh to $110/MWh by 2029, with Rystad Energy warning coal is exiting twice as fast as renewables are being built. Households already feel it, with out-of-pocket electricity costs up 12.8% in the year to September as rebates expired: The Australian

Macquarie Bank will pay a $14m penalty after admitting its “welcome rate” on savings accounts was confusingly described. When rates rose in 2022, the standard rate caught up to the welcome rate, so the bonus disappeared. It’s also paid $8.8m to nearly 40,000 customers, with ASIC blaming weak systems and controls, not just unclear wording: AFR

Qantas will outsource 850 head office jobs to consultancy Accenture under a seven-year deal to replace more than 1,000 outdated IT systems and speed up its use of AI. The first cuts land mid-2027. The Australian Services Union says AI is just cover for offshoring, but shares still rose 5.6%: AFR

Canva staff are flocking to tech union Professionals Australia after the company axed 22% of its workforce. About 300 workers attended union meetings, up to five times the usual turnout. The union wants Canva to extend the deadline to choose between relocating to Sydney or taking redundancy: AFR