legislation

Louisiana lawmakers are considering House Bill 672 (HB 672), a proposal to establish a state-run catastrophe reinsurance program aimed at addressing rising insurance costs in high-risk areas. Central to the bill is a funding mechanism involving state-issued bonds, which the bill refers to as catastrophe bonds, however, recent industry feedback has cast doubt on both […]

The Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney has spoken out on capital inflows into reinsurance, saying that a ‘soft cycle’ in the financial markets (referring to interest rates) is driving capital into reinsurance and causing a soft cycle there.

The Isle of Man’s Insurance and Pensions Authority (IPA) is the latest offshore domicile which is seeking to introduce insurance special purpose vehicle (SPV) legislation, as it hopes to attract insurance-linked securities (ILS) and catastrophe bond business.

Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney warned that insurers need to be accountable for their actions today and that the Bank of England is watchful of any risks from moves such as insurers or reinsurers adopting more aggressive investment strategies.

Another offshore domicile has thrown its hat into the ring to compete for catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) business. Puerto Rico is reportedly the latest domicile to amend its insurance legislation in an attempt to bring the ILS sector to its shores.

Newly proposed regulations from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) could change the way certain over-the-counter derivative transactions are treated for taxation purposes. The proposal would generally allow for OTC derivatives which are based on objective non-financial information to qualify as notional principal contracts (NPC’s).

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been seeking to bring proposed rules into force regarding new shelf eligibility requirements for asset-backed securities (ABS). The proposed rules seek to enforce greater accountability and enhanced quality around ABS when an issuer uses a shelf registration process.

The Tennessee legislative and Governor Bill Haslem have implemented and signed into law a new bill designed to make the state a more attractive place for captive insurer formation. Amongst various changes to the way captives are governed in Tennessee of most interest to us is the introduction of a new class of captive insurer […]

The Cayman Islands government has been working on a new set of laws to govern it’s insurance industry and the licensing of insurers and captives on the islands. Cayman has become the main domicile for cat bonds in recent years and plays host to many captive insurers as well. The Caymans ‘Insurance Law 2010’ will […]

Today I happened across a great article written by Barlow Lyde & Gilbert LLP (a leading international law firm with a big reinsurance practice) which takes a look at the recent International Association of Insurance Supervisors report (as we wrote about here) and seeks to answer some of the questions it raises.