Still smarting from the recession and global competition, U.S. firms had been hoping for stability in 2011. What they got instead — as shown by The American Lawyer’s latest survey of Am Law 200 firm leaders — were slow-paying clients, struggling transactional practices and, if they’re lucky, the prospect of modest billing increases in the months ahead.

Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr is facing the prospect of making $214 million in payments to one of its clients — an amount that would potentially put the case among the largest public settlements ever for legal malpractice, people in the field say.

Entergy Corp., which faces the prospect of a 2012 shutdown of a nuclear plant it runs in Vermont, has filed a lawsuit that raises constitutional questions about a state’s role in regulating a participant in the nuclear industry.

Lawyers who forgo the use of videos to settle personal injury cases should brace themselves for the prospect of smaller settlements, says attorney Salvatore J. Zambri

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s new power to take over and liquidate nonbank companies whose failure would jeopardize the financial system is intended as a “third way” between bankruptcy and bailout.