Business

Marsh McLennan Agency continued its acquisition spree with a deal to buy HMS Insurance Associates Inc., an 80-year-old Hunt Valley company. MMA, a subsidiary of Marsh McLennan (NYSE: MMC), in announcing the deal Wednesday, said that HMS Insurance’s more than 120 employees, including President Gary L. Berger, will join MMA and continue to work out of the Hunt Valley office. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Family members of five staff members murdered at the Capital Gazette in 2018, as well as survivors of the mass shooting, have reached a confidential settlement in lawsuits that claimed that the newspaper’s parent companies were negligent and failed to take reasonable steps to protect employees. Lawyers filed a two-page stipulation of dismissal on Tuesday in Anne Arundel County Circuit Court for the claims against The Baltimore Sun Co. LLC and Tribune Publishing Co. LLC. 

A busy Lutherville corner once home to a gas station will soon transform into a fast-casual food hub. Starbucks and honeygrow recently signed 10-year deals to open at York and Ridgely roads in about a year, developer Mark Renbaum said Tuesday. The two chains will open near a site recently identified for a $228.5 million transit-oriented development linked to the light rail line at Lutherville Station.

Profiles, a Baltimore public relations agency specializing in marketing, communications and social media, has named a new CEO. Amy Burke Friedman assumed the role effective January 1, taking over for Profiles’ founder Amy Elias. Burke Friedman has been with the company for 20 years, serving as president for the last 15 years, and has worked alongside Elias to develop the company into a local “powerhouse,” Elias said Wednesday.

The owner of the Ever Forward container ship, which ran aground in the Chesapeake Bay in March, will pay Maryland nearly $700,000 to enhance local oyster bars as a penalty for the accident, following a Wednesday morning vote from Maryland’s Board of Public Works.

The Ravens received final approval Wednesday to extend their lease of M&T Bank Stadium for 15 more seasons, through 2037, and potentially through the 2047 season. Though the current lease’s expiration date is nearly five years away, the new contract was negotiated with the team’s landlord, the Maryland Stadium Authority, with the expectation that the Ravens soon would begin requesting bonds to renovate the stadium.

Southwest Airlines is apologizing to thousands of customers whose flights were disrupted after Christmas by offering them frequent flyer points worth hundreds of dollars. “I’ll stay with Southwest,” said Justin Bass, a Southwest passenger from Baltimore. More than a week after Southwest canceled 15,000 flights, leaving tens of thousands of passengers in the lurch, the airline has come up with a new way to say, “We’re sorry” in an e-mail from the CEO himself.

The long-anticipated deal to move CFG Bank’s headquarters to Baltimore Peninsula has been finalized. The bank will move into 97,000 square feet of space at 2455 House St. by the end of the year, officials said Wednesday morning. Details of the CFG lease deal first surfaced in mid-September, even as negotiations remained ongoing for the anchor tenant of the seven-story, red-brick tower. House Street will be the new name for the street formerly known as Banner Street, a spokesperson for the development said.