Author: completebodyneeds

After bypassing the April 1 deadline and engaging in weeks of debate and compromise, New York lawmakers have agreed on a $268.5 billion budget that includes auto insurance reforms championed by Gov. Kathy Hochul that are intended to reduce auto insurance costs for drivers and businesses. The auto insurance reforms target fraud, “runaway” litigation, legal loopholes, non-economic damages and enforcement gaps in an effort to lower insurance costs. They are key parts of a $268.5 billion budget for the 2026-2027 fiscal year that seeks to tackle rising insurance, energy, housing, childcare, education and other everyday costs for New Yorkers. The…

Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz appeared all but deserted on Thursday as commercial operators remain wary of renewed military escalation.No commercial vessels were spotted transiting the waterway Thursday morning as tensions spiked following a second round of US strikes against Iranian military targets this week. The halt follows a sluggish Wednesday, which saw just six two-way crossings, including a Turkish Suezmax entering to load cargo in the Persian Gulf, according to ship-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. Iran claimed that several ships attempted unauthorized entry into the Persian Gulf last night, some of which turned back, while two were stopped.…

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton added WhatsApp to the growing list of companies he has accused of violating Texans’ data privacy, announcing a lawsuit against the messaging app and its parent company, Meta, last week. The lawsuit states WhatsApp is deceiving its users by claiming to offer “end-to-end encryption,” or a software that conceals the contents of a message to anyone, including the company, except to the sender and receiver. This follows Paxton’s lawsuit against Netflix, also over privacy issues, earlier this month and a recent settlement with smart TV maker LG electronics, all while he pursues the Republican nomination…

CNN on Thursday filed a lawsuit against Perplexity in New York federal court, alleging the AI search engine provider is unlawfully distributing its copyrighted content, marking the latest legal tussle between the AI firm and a news publisher. The complaint said that Perplexity unlawfully copied thousands of CNN stories, videos and images to power its products and distributes “identical or substantially similar” competing content. “You can’t copyright facts,” Perplexity spokesperson Jesse Dwyer said in response to the lawsuit. CNN is asking for an unspecified amount of monetary damages and a court order blocking Perplexity from violating its intellectual property rights.…

CNN on Thursday filed a lawsuit against Perplexity in New York federal court, alleging the AI search engine provider is unlawfully distributing its copyrighted content, marking the latest legal tussle between the AI firm and a news publisher. The complaint said that Perplexity unlawfully copied thousands of CNN stories, videos and images to power its products and distributes “identical or substantially similar” competing content. “You can’t copyright facts,” Perplexity spokesperson Jesse Dwyer said in response to the lawsuit. CNN is asking for an unspecified amount of monetary damages and a court order blocking Perplexity from violating its intellectual property rights.…

There are millions of chemical tanks around the U.S., and experts say it is exceedingly rare for them to fail as long as they are properly maintained and inspected. Yet this past week, there were two major hazardous chemical emergencies on the West Coast. A large tank containing a corrosive chemical at a Longview, Washington, paper mill ruptured on Tuesday, killing two and possibly nine others. And late last week about 50,000 people were evacuated in Southern California after a chemical tank overheated and threatened the area with a catastrophic explosion. Authorities mitigated that risk, and people have been able…

The U.S. faces a widening gap between growing flood risk and the take-up of flood insurance, potentially exposing the nation to more than $375 billion in aggregated uninsured flood losses from a 1-in-100-year event, according to a new whitepaper from Moody’s. The growing insurance protection gap, now at 65%, poses a significant financial risk to households and local governments, which have long relied on FEMA Specific Flood Hazard Area (SFHA) maps primarily based on riverine flooding, and generally don’t account for flood risk from storm surge, sea level rise or extreme precipitation, the Moody’s report said. This exposes counties to…

Convex Group Ltd., the international specialty insurer and reinsurer, announced it has received in-principle approval to launch Lloyd’s Syndicate 1987, which is planned to commence underwriting on July 1, 2026, subject to appropriate regulatory approvals. With capacity to support the approved business plan provided by Convex, Syndicate 1987 will focus exclusively on long-tail specialty lines, deploying capacity across a targeted portfolio of casualty insurance and reinsurance, and political risk and trade credit. Asta will be the managing agent of the new syndicate and Allison Hollern, head of financial institutions at Convex, will become active underwriter, subject to regulatory approval. “The…

Panama’s National Assembly approved a law that requires multinational entities domiciled in the country to demonstrate real local operations or face a 15% tax on passive foreign income, the Ministry of Economy and Finance said on Wednesday. The law is intended to help satisfy European Union tax transparency requirements and support the country’s removal from EU monitoring lists. “At the fiscal level, it requires multinationals to demonstrate that they have physical operations and real activity in a country, beyond just seeking tax advantage,” the National Assembly said in a separate statement on Wednesday. Entities that fail to prove economic substance…

More German drivers switched to an electric vehicle in the first quarter of this year than ever before after the government launched a major subsidy program that can shave as much as €6,000 ($6,967) off the price of a new car. The share of drivers replacing their combustion-engine cars with an EV rose to 7.5% in the period, from 6.3% the previous quarter, according to a survey for insurer HUK-COBURG published Thursday. That was the highest figure since the poll began in early 2020. About a fifth of respondents cited the new subsidy as having a direct impact on their…