Burdened by debt and driving home from a night of gambling in West Virginia, Sergio Lopez launched a scheme that at the time must have seemed like a good idea. He pulled his Volkswagen Jetta up to a random corner in ... [full story]

Shares of insurance companies saw broad gains Monday, with many posting double-digit percentage-point increases, as investors bought into stocks that had seen a steady decline in recent weeks. The sector also saw more national insurers, including The Travelers Cos. and Principal ... [full story]

Wells Fargo Insurance Services -- a unit of San Francisco-based Wells Fargo & Co. -- has acquired the EMAR Group, a large commercial insurance brokerage based in Livingston, N.J., with offices in Florida, Wells said Monday. Terms of the deal were ... [full story]

Barely noticed in the clamor over the financial industry bailout, a multibillion-dollar rescue operation is under way in Washington to keep one of the world's largest insurers afloat. The foundering giant is the federal government's own National Flood Insurance Program, ... [full story]