Freshfields is forcing out certain partners. The firm overhauled how partners get paid in 2025, scrapping tenure-based points for a performance model. That’s now a common move by law firms to attract top earners. Since then, the firm has culled equity partners, with dozens of its partners across London, Paris and Germany copping fewer equity points as a result: FT

⚖️ Construction: CBH engaged Martinus Rail to build rail infrastructure at Broomehill, WA, and a dispute arose over whether a payment schedule was issued within SOPA's strict 15-business day window. The WA Court of Appeal has confirmed in CBH v Martinus Rail that a SOPA payment claim is 'made' when an email becomes capable of retrieval. The contract's own clause, deeming weekend emails received at 9am the next business day, couldn't override that. Here, a payment claim landed on a Saturday, so the clock started immediately. CBH's payment schedule, calculated using the contract's later deemed date, missed the deadline: Allens

⚖️ Regulatory: Deutsche Bank has paid a $2m penalty after ASIC found it botched the reporting of over 260,000 OTC derivative transactions between October 2024 and August 2025. The bank misreported the mandatory ‘direction’ field — the data point showing whether it was acting as buyer or seller at a specified price — for more than 264,000 FX and commodities transactions across 208 separate business days. ASIC considers the failures systemic, pointing to deficiencies in Deutsche Bank’s internal reporting framework rather than one-off errors. The bank’s cooperated, paid up and is fixing its systems, but compliance isn’t an admission of guilt: ASIC

⚖️ Corporate: Directors will soon be traceable. The Commonwealth Register (Repeal) Rules 2026 (Cth) took effect on 29 June 2026, clearing out the old preparatory rules for ASIC's registry transfer functions. The headline change for non-executive directors: from 1 July 2027, Director Identification Numbers will link directly to the ASIC Companies Register, making it far easier for regulators, counterparties and the public to trace individuals sitting across multiple boards. ASIC also picks up expanded powers to protect personal information on its registers: G+T

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Turns out Albo's negative gearing gamble might actually pay off. A Capital Brief/DemosAU poll finds 45% of Aussies think a modest house price fall would be a good thing, only 24% think it'd be bad. Jim Chalmers isn't apologising either, telling voters he'd rather fix a broken market than cling to a "busted status quo": Capital Brief

Trump has reinstated the US naval blockade on Iranian ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and wants a 20% "reimbursement" fee on all other cargo passing through, on top of resumed US strikes on Iran. Iran's foreign minister mocked the move, calling Tehran the Strait's "forever guardian": Bloomberg

💰 oOh!media's three-way auction has heated up, with one bidder lifting its offer to $1.65 a share, valuing the outdoor advertiser at $872m. PEP's holding firm at $1.60, while it’s not clear if I Squared and Oaktree upped their offers. Some reckon the price could climb as high as $1.80: Capital Brief

🎬 In the US, a coalition of 12 Democratic state attorneys-general is suing to block Paramount Skydance's $110bn buy of Warner Bros Discovery, arguing the tie-up would gut competition across cinemas and cable. Paramount has vowed to fight it, insisting the deal helps it compete with Netflix: FT

⛏️ Genesis Minerals and Vault Minerals have officially agreed to merge via scheme of arrangement, creating the third largest ASX-listed gold producer. The merged group weighs in at $12.6bn market cap, with $2bn in flagged synergies from overlapping WA operations: ASX