Sept 9 (Reuters) - The following are the top stories on the New York Times business pages. Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.

- For years, Wells Fargo & Co employees secretly issued credit cards without a customer's consent. They created fake email accounts to sign up customers for online banking services. They set up sham accounts that customers learned about only after they started accumulating fees. On Thursday, these illegal banking practices cost Wells Fargo $185 million in fines, including a $100 million penalty from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the largest such penalty the agency has issued. http://nyti.ms/2bWJ9rR

- The former chief financial officer of the real estate investing giant American Realty Capital Properties Inc was arrested on Thursday morning at his home in Pennsylvania on charges that he fraudulently inflated financial performance numbers for the company in 2014. http://nyti.ms/2bY7iDg

- Short-term rental company Airbnb, under fire over the ease with which its hosts can reject potential renters based on race, age, gender or other factors, told its rental hosts on Thursday that they needed to agree to a "community commitment" starting on Nov. 1 and that they must hew to a new nondiscrimination policy. http://nyti.ms/2bY6G0z

- U.S. regulators are seeking to impose further restrictions on the ability of Wall Street banks to make risky investments with their own money. If the new rules proceed, banks will be prohibited from buying and selling commodities, like copper, and would have to shut down what remains of their in-house private equity operations. http://nyti.ms/2bY98nF

- With the iconic Palace of Westminster, Britain's seat of Parliament, crumbling dangerously after decades of neglect, legislators moved a step closer on Thursday to agreeing on a plan for renovation, which includes vacating the entire building for at least six years. http://nyti.ms/2bY8u9A

- On Friday, the U.S. House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on the Investment Advisers Modernization Act of 2016, a bill that will loosen the information that the industry must report to regulators about the nature of its investments. http://nyti.ms/2bY7qCJ (Compiled by Ismail Shakil in Bengaluru)