WellPoint to buy Medicaid provider Amerigroup for $4.46B

WellPoint is purchasing rival Amerigroup as insurers are positioning themselves for coming changes in Medicaid laws. (Getty Images file / July 9, 2012)

Health insurer WellPoint Inc. will buy rival Amerigroup Corp. for $4.46 billion in a major bet on the expansion of the U.S. government's Medicaid health plans for the poor.

The companies announced the deal Monday, just a week and a half after the Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obama's health care law, which aims to extend coverage to more than 30 million uninsured Americans.

SC State Ports Authority to develop inland port

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — The South Carolina State Ports Authority board agreed Monday to begin engineering studies on an inland port in Greer to provide more efficient movement of cargo to the coast by rail.

"It's been our belief that the successful growth of intermodal container movements in our state and in our region really requires us to look beyond our traditional port facilities," authority President and CEO Jim Newsome told the board during a teleconference.

The new facility, described by Newsome as "a port without water" and to be developed with Norfolk Southern, will be operated by the authority. It will provide a place for transferring shipping containers between trains and trucks for shipment to or from the coast.

The plan has big advantages for South Carolina motorists. Newsome estimated that the port could eventually eliminate 50,000 truck trips a year on busy Interstate 26 between Charleston and the Greenville-Spartanburg area.