Spain's unemployment rate shot up to a record 26.02 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012, leaving almost six million people out of work, the National Statistics Institute said Thursday.

The Senate Democratic leader is promising to act this year on legislation that went nowhere in the last Congress, including aid to victims of Superstorm Sandy and financial help for the U.S. Postal Service.

Verizon Communications' fourth-quarter losses escalated, dragged down by restructuring, pension and Superstorm Sandy costs.

AmTrust Financial Services Inc. said Tuesday that it is buying a fellow insurer, privately held Sequoia Insurance Co., for about $60 million as it seeks to bolster growth.

Health insurer WellPoint Inc. will revisit a tumultuous 2012 that included a CEO resignation and choppy earnings when it releases results on Wednesday from last year's final quarter.

Aetna Inc. will sell a Missouri Medicaid business that manages care for more than 100,000 people to fellow health insurer WellCare Health Plans Inc. due to Aetna's pending acquisition of Coventry Health Care Inc.

President Barack Obama appealed for "one nation and one people" in his second inaugural address. Any notion that the country's bitter partisanship might fade, however, seemed tempered by the president's newly assertive push of central Democratic tenets: safety-net programs for the poor, equal rights for gays and minorities and government...

The pension fund for one of Hostess Brands' unions has hired an investment bank to represent workers and pensioners as the maker of Twinkies and Wonder Bread sells off its brands.