Insights

English law has long treated the choice between terminating for repudiatory breach and exercising a contractual termination right as consequential. Under the Financings[1] causation principle, a party exercising a contractual right for a non-repudiatory breach could recover losses accrued to the date of termination — but nothing more. Loss of bargain was out of reach unless the breach went to the root of the contract. A practical workaround, confirmed in Lombard,[2] was to designate the relevant obligation as a condition, elevating any breach to repudiatory status, but that device carries significant strategic risk if the termination is later found to have been wrongful.

Of particular interest for investors with interests in Canada or the UAE, for counsel advising on treaty coverage, dispute strategy, or treaty design, the Canada-UAE FIPA is essential reading and the clearest evidence yet of where Canada's investment treaty practice stands over 30 years after NAFTA came into force.

Over the past 18 months, the federal banking agencies have clarified supervisory expectations for banks’ crypto-asset activities, and several of the largest U.S. banks have announced programs accepting Bitcoin and Ether as loan collateral. Separately, on June 3, 2026, New York’s enactment of the 2022 amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code took effect, changing the rules governing the perfection of a security interest in digital asset collateral in New York, the jurisdiction whose law governs most institutional credit documentation. Together, these developments may create significant opportunities for lenders navigating the complexities to comply with the newly enacted statutes. This alert surveys the current landscape, from regulatory permissibility and perfection through custody, structuring, and compliance, for institutions active in this market or considering entering it.

In Appeal of Bahadir (a C&M case), the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals denied the government’s motion to dismiss in its entirety, ruling in favor of the contractor on both key issues raised by the government. The case arises from a contract for construction work at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, under which Appellant alleged government-caused delay and filed certified prolongation claims using a “windows analysis” methodology. The government moved to dismiss, arguing that Appellant failed to state a sum certain for each of what the government characterized as 38 distinct claims, and separately that four claims had not been properly presented to the Contracting Officer. 

This news bulletin is provided by the International Trade Group of Crowell & Moring. If you have questions or need assistance on trade law matters, please contact Anand Sithian or Simeon Yerokun or any member of the International Trade Group.

On July 22, 2026, Missouri Attorney General Catherine L. Hanaway filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Kansas City, Missouri, challenging the city’s longstanding Minority and Women Business Enterprise (MWBE) program as unconstitutional. The AG filed the complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri alongside private plaintiffs Charles Cacioppo Jr. and his company, Industrial Salvage and Wrecking Co.

The State of Qatar has enacted Law No. (8) of 2026, amending certain provisions of Law No. (4) of 2008 concerning the Leasing of Real Estate.

On July 20, 2026, New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill signed the Forbidding the Algorithmic Inflation of Rent (FAIR) Act into law, making New Jersey the fourth state to regulate algorithmic rent-setting practices. Three days later, on July 23, 2026, Governor Sherrill signed the Fair Price Protection Act, which targets “surveillance pricing”—the practice of using or collecting personal data about a user and using an algorithm or artificial intelligence to charge different consumers different prices for the same products. Together, these laws represent a significant expansion of New Jersey's consumer protection framework in the algorithmic pricing context.

New York is set to become the first state in the nation to restrict algorithmically-driven “addictive” social media features for users under 18. On July 29, 2026, the State published the final rules implementing the Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation (SAFE) for Kids Act, which takes effect January 25, 2027.

On July 28, 2026, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) updated its Covered List, established through the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act to include foreign-produced connected power inverters and advanced robotic devices. The designation of these products to the Covered List follows an Executive Branch national security determination that they “pose unacceptable risks to the national security of the United States or the safety and security of United States persons.” Equipment listed on the Covered List is ineligible for FCC equipment authorization, effectively prohibiting the import, sale, or marketing of those products absent an exception or approval. This action comes only months after the FCC added consumer-grade routers to the Covered List on March 23, 2026 and uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS) on December 22, 2025. Taken together, these actions reflect the FCC’s increasingly expansive approach to using its authorities to guard against foreign produced connected technologies that may create vulnerabilities enabling disruption of critical infrastructure, unauthorized access to sensitive information, or cyber intrusions. The shift is a departure from the FCC’s previous focus on equipment and services produced by certain PRC and Russian companies.

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (“Section 230”) protects online platforms from liability for user-generated speech. Based on the premise that platforms generally do not create original content but instead curate their users’ own speech, Section 230’s protections have historically applied to a platform’s algorithmically assembled, selected or sequenced content; algorithms or features that amplified or directed user generated speech to particular users were generally protected. Indeed, the old rule of thumb was the more a platform used algorithms or automation, the more likely user generated speech remained user generated speech. GenAI has the potential to change that calculus. A platform that ingests user generated content and publishes a transformed output, can blur Section 230’s line between publication and creation. The central question is whether Section 230 protects GenAI, which analyzes, but does not alter, user-created content to produce an outcome, and its corresponding outputs.

On July 23, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division announced that it will again use targeted Second Request investigations and released a revised Model Timing Agreement, another signal that this Antitrust Division continues to take a more business friendly approach toward merger review. The model introduces an optional “Expedited Consideration” process that gives merging parties the option to address discrete competitive concerns identified by the DOJ before undertaking full Second Request compliance.

Two federal appellate courts have now looked at analogous allegations of price fixing using AI-driven pricing software and reached opposite conclusions—creating an arguable circuit split and providing additional guidance to companies using algorithmic pricing tools.

The rapid buildout of AI infrastructure has placed data centers at the heart of a new and expanding wave of class action litigation. Over the past several months, plaintiffs’ firms with significant experience in mass tort and environmental class actions have begun recruiting plaintiffs and filing lawsuits against data center operators, alleging that noise generated by their facilities — from cooling systems, diesel generators, and HVAC equipment — constitutes a public and private nuisance and reflects actionable negligence. Companies currently operating or constructing data centers near residential communities should treat this as a material and growing legal risk.

On June 18, 2026, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) added microplastics to the list of Candidate Chemicals maintained under the state’s Safer Consumer Products (SCP) regulations.  The listing of microplastics, which becomes effective on October 1, 2026, is the first step in the SCP regulatory process, which could lead to restrictions on products that contain or release microplastics. 

GAO’s recent dismissal of the protest in Tyonek Technical Innovations, LLC, B-424364, B-424364.2, June 30, 2026, carries an important lesson for government contractors: if you believe solicitation terms conflict with a statute or regulation, you must raise that challenge before proposals are due—not during discussions or afterwards.

It is well established that “[c]ompetitive prejudice is an essential element of every viable protest.” Yet, for decades, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has tempered this requirement with two critical corollaries: protesters need only demonstrate a “reasonable possibility” that they were prejudiced by an agency’s actions, and GAO “will resolve doubts regarding prejudice in favor of the protester.” These principles have been consistent features of GAO’s bid protest jurisprudence for more than 30 years. See, e.g., United Int’l Eng'g, Inc., B-245448, Jan. 29, 1992, 71 CPD ¶ 177.

On July 13, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit affirmed a preliminary injunction against Nielsen, handing Cumulus Media a significant win in a constructive tying case with implications beyond the radio ratings industry. Cumulus Media New Holdings Inc. v. The Nielsen Co. (US), LLC, No. 26-88 (2d Cir. Jul. 13, 2026).

On July 17, 2026, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that it had entered into a Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA) with The Scoular Company (Scoular), an agricultural supply chain company based in Omaha, Nebraska, to resolve allegations that Scoular relied on customs brokers to bribe Mexican government officials to allow Scoular goods to pass customs inspections and be delivered to Mexico from the United States. As part of its resolution, Scoular agreed to pay a $9,769,521 criminal penalty and forfeit an additional $414,351. Scoular also committed to continue cooperating with DOJ on any ongoing or future criminal investigations, implement a compliance and ethics program designed to prevent and detect violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), and periodically report to DOJ on remediation and implementation of compliance measures throughout the term of the DPA.

A recently filed class action lawsuit against Gymshark, a prominent athletic apparel company, highlights the escalating legal risks associated with influencer marketing. The complaint, brought in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on June 16, 2026, alleges that Gymshark systematically paid social media influencers to promote its products without ensuring that the influencers were providing clear and conspicuous disclosures about such payment, in violation of Federal Trade Commission (FTC) guidance and New York state law.