A vote planned for October by EU lawmakers will most probably be postponed following the failure to reach an agreement on a final draft of the strict new set of rules proposed for regulating the insurance industry, known as Solvency II. EU officials and lawmakers failed to come to an agreement before the beginning of the European Parliament's annual summer break, and will now have to try and…

Low interest rates "an enormous stress"

The current European economic climate, created by efforts to try to stimulate economic growth and rescue an ailing banking sector, is placing the insurance industry under "enormous stress". This according to Nikolaus von Bomhard, Chief Executive of Munich Re, one of the world's largest investors with a portfolio of more than €200 billion (US$245…

Bank Danamon Indonesia has announced that, in partnership with Asuransi Jiwa Manulife Indonesia, the bank will be offering new insurance and wealth management products. The bancassurance deal, which is set to run for ten years, is a follow up of a partnership agreement between the two companies in October 2011. The agreement was to grow bancassurance in Indonesia, and has now come into effect a…

As the London Interbank Overnight Rate, or Libor, scandal continues to boil into a deep and ugly stew, insurers around the world are left with an ominous premonition that the industry could be hit by billions in losses. In order to fully understand the situation, and the potential hit to the insurance industry's bottom line, it is important to know more about the background of Libor and the situation…

Price Reduction With Insurance Competition As a direct result of competition and strategic partnerships, prices for insurance in multiple areas are decreasing throughout the world. Originating out of public outcry for lower prices, or companies aiming to provide better services to their…

Insurance Australia Group (IAG) is planning to expand its presence in Asia following successful initial investments worth around US$735.5 million in five countries including India and Thailand. The expansion is part of IAG's long term goal to have 10 percent or more of its premiums come from Asia by 2016. IAG's CEO, Mike Wilkins was confident that building on the company's investments was the…

The National Bank of Fujairah (NBF) and the Oman Insurance Company (OIC) have signed a lucrative strategic agreement that will pave the way for the bank to release a number of new insurance products in the near future. The latest deal comes a month after Oman Insurance Company signed a similar agreement with another leading bank in the United Arab Emirates, Commercial Bank International. It comes…

German insurance company Talanx has recently scaled Poland's insurer rankings to sit comfortably as the second largest German insurance company. Within the past month, Talanx has made several core acquisitions that helped it expand in size and quality. After cooperating with Japanese insurer Meiji Yasuda to acquire Wroclaw-based Europa Group, Talanx went on to complete the acquisition of Belgium-based…

Moody's Japan K.K., a Japanese based ratings agency, recently upped the outlook of Japan's property & casualty insurance industry from negative to stable. The established ratings company predicts that ongoing restructurings within the industry will lead to increased earnings within the next year or two. Last year, according to Swiss Re sigma data, Japanese non-life insurers earned a 2.8 percent growth…

Insurance brokerages across Europe expressed frustration towards the European Commission's (EC) latest revision of the Insurance Mediation Directive (IMD II), and specifically the component that makes remuneration disclosure in a transaction mandatory. While not all of the regulations introduced were negative, broking organizations will not give up pressure on the EC to modify the rules until the…