October 23, 2012, Laurel Brubaker Calkins and Margaret Cronin Fisk, Bloomberg News – BP PLC urged a U.S. federal judge to approve a proposed US$7.8-billion settlement of thousands of claims by coastal businesses and property owners who sued over economic damages from the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. “The settlement will bring full compensation to all class members, including those on the Gulf Coast, while resolving a major component of the Deepwater Horizon litigation,” BP lawyers said Monday in an after-hours filing in New Orleans. “The alternative is all-out litigation that would last many years and have an uncertain outcome for class members.”