Author: completebodyneeds

Yemen’s Houthi militant group said it would attack Saudi oil tankers in the northern Red Sea, a potential fresh escalation in its attacks on shipping. Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the move was a result of the kingdom diverting ships away from the Bab el-Mandeb chokepoint to the south of the waterway. The group said last month that it would begin attacking Saudi vessels in retaliation for a blockade on Yemeni ports. That added a new risk to global energy markets, with the Iran war already restricting flows through the Strait of Hormuz and Saudi Arabia relying on its…

Allianz SE agreed to buy the asset management unit of Singapore’s United Overseas Bank Ltd., marking the German insurer’s second major deal in recent days as Chief Executive Officer Oliver Baete pursues growth in the region. Allianz Global Investors, an asset management arm of the insurer, will pay S$555 million ($433 million) excluding one-off transaction costs for UOB Asset Management Ltd., according to a statement Wednesday, which confirmed an earlier Bloomberg News report. Allianz announced a deal to buy HSBC Holdings Plc’s Singapore insurance unit for S$2.7 billion on July 24. Read more: Allianz to Buy HSBC’s Singapore Insurer in…

Chubb announced key executive appointments within Westchester, the company’s wholesale excess and surplus (E&S) lines business in North America. Dave Lupica Dave Lupica, vice president, Chubb Group and division president, Westchester, has been named executive chairman. Dave Roberts, currently chief operating officer, Westchester, has been appointed vice president, Chubb Group and division president, Westchester, succeeding Lupica. The appointments are effective immediately. Dave Roberts Lupica will provide governance oversight and advise on strategy for Chubb’s wholesale E&S business in North America. During his 26 years with Chubb, Lupica has played a pivotal role in the company’s growth and evolution. From building…

Orion180 Insurance has rolled out a residential private flood insurance offering in California. The product provides up to $1 million in building coverage, waiting periods as short as 10 days and a streamlined application process. Policies are designed to meet FMAC and FNMA requirements. Coverage options include loss of use, replacement cost for personal property, water backup and sump pump overflow, swimming pool cleanup and repair and debris removal. It covers X, A and V flood zones. Orion180 operates as a surplus lines carrier serving Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Colorado, Illinois and Arizona.…

New Jersey sued Amazon.com on Tuesday, accusing the online retailer of abusing its market power over independent delivery drivers in the state. Amazon used its dominance to impose low pay and poor conditions on thousands of New Jersey workers who deliver for the company via its Delivery Service Partner program, the state alleged in the lawsuit filed in federal court in Newark, New Jersey. “This complaint is not grounded in fact,” said Steve Kelly, an Amazon spokesperson. Attorney General Jennifer Davenport’s office said it was the first lawsuit in which a state has accused a company of illegal conduct to…

Southern California Edison equipment sparked a January 2025 wildfire that killed 19 people in the Los Angeles area, fire officials said. The Eaton Fire was caused by electrical arcing events that took place on an out-of-service tower on a dry hillside, the Los Angeles County Fire Department said in a statement Tuesday. The blaze destroyed or damaged more than 9,000 homes and businesses and burned 14,000 acres, the report said. Edison International’s Southern California utility faces lawsuits from more than 32,000 plaintiffs alleging its equipment sparked the fatal blaze that leveled the Altadena suburb. The fire department report comes less…

Plymouth Rock Assurance Makes Leadership Appointments Plymouth Rock Assurance, headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, appointed Gavin McPhail as vice president and chief data officer; Cornelius Young as vice president and chief claims officer, independent agency group; and Lindsay Mustard as vice president, customer service, independent agency group. McPhail will lead Plymouth Rock’s enterprise data strategy, advancing Plymouth Rock’s use of data, analytics, automation, and artificial intelligence (AI). McPhail has over 20 years of leadership experience, most recently serving as executive vice president and general manager of risk intelligence at Fusable, where he led the company’s insurance risk intelligence data-as-a-service business. Young…

Swaths of seaweed are blanketing the beaches and coastlines of the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, suffocating shorelines and snuffing out marine life while spooking visitors in areas that depend heavily on tourism. Some 27 million metric tons of self-sustaining sargassum have been recorded in the Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico in July, according to a report released Friday by the University of South Florida’s Optical Oceanography Lab. The prickly seaweed covers miles of coastline, releasing a foul smell as it rots onshore. This year marks the first time that scientists have observed sargassum growing in large quantities in…

In a significant decision issued on February 25, 2026, the First District Court of Appeal (DCA) ruled in Publix Super Markets, Inc., et al. v. Department of Financial Services, et al., 430 So. 3d 252 (Fla. 1st DCA 2026), that while injured workers have an absolute right to choose their own pharmacy or pharmacist, that right does not extend to physicians who dispense medications directly to their patients. The ruling is an important development in the long-running debate between workers’ compensation insurers and physicians who dispense medications from their offices. Critics of physician dispensing have argued that the practice can…

A group of Democratic senators urged the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to rein in prediction market trading on wildfires, expressing concern that individuals could be tempted to commit arson to make their bets pay off. “As the United States faces yet another record-breaking fire season this year” the CFTC “cannot allow these prediction markets to offer unrestricted betting on wildfires,” Senator Jeff Merkley and others wrote in a letter to Chairman Michael Selig. The eight other signatories to the letter represent a variety of states impacted by wildfires, including Amy Klobuchar, the top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee, which…