Insurance

As Congress moves quickly toward passing regulatory relief legislation, another financial services policy goal — long-term reform of the National Flood Insurance Program — remains stalled.

The insurance company has made no effort to shrink or simplify since being designated as systemically important, and regulators should not remove heightened federal oversight until it does.

The mutual has agreed to buy Cape Ann Insurance, which specializes in personal insurance products.

Financial agencies must prepare themselves to evaluate the practical effects of automated decision-making in lending and other programs to better detect fair-lending violations.

Associated Banc-Corp has agreed to buy an insurance broker in Milwaukee after unveiling agreements to buy a community bank last summer and a Chicagoland wealth management firm in the fall.

Three senators have unveiled a bill that would allow captive insurance companies to regain full membership in the Federal Home Loan Bank System.

You read that right. Community bankers hope efforts by JPMorgan Chase, Amazon and Berkshire Hathaway will drive down health care costs — and maybe create products or services they can use.

The companies said they plan to set up an independent firm “that is free from profit-making incentives and constraints” to offer health care to their employees.

The Alabama bank has named one of its own to head up the company’s property and casualty insurance business, and it has made a key hire in its health care banking group.

Colonial Savings founder James S. DuBose died after a yearlong battle with cancer. He was 93.