The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. announced today that longtime banking executive Liam E. McGee, 55, has been appointed the company's chairman and chief executive officer to succeed a retiring Ramani Ayer.

Actuaries and other insurance industry analysts seeking a broad range of mathematical and statistical functionality now can access 1,415 numerical routines in the Mark 22 release of the NAG Toolbox for MATLAB.

With the typhoon season in full swing, a catastrophe modeling firm estimated Japan would sustain an insured loss of more than $18 billion if the 1959 Super Typhoon Vera hit today.