The liberalisation of foreign investment in the Indian insurance sector has been a subject of debate for more than a decade. In her Budget speech of 1 February 2021, the minister of finance, Nirmala Sitharaman, announced that the foreign investment limit in the insurance sector is set to be increased from 49% to 74%, with some safeguards in relation to…
The very reason why insurance is purchased by individuals and businesses is to ensure that they are ‘covered’, at least financially, when a nasty or unexpected event occurs. The efficient management and payment of claims is therefore the most important service that insurers and their partners in the market, such as brokers, loss adjusters and lawyers, can offer their customers. Sadly, all too often…
There has been a lot of talking up of captives during the last few years, with momentum growing in the last year or two, and a feeling that a new dawn was approaching for the sector. According to Commercial Risk Europe’s Captives Report 2020 – Captives: Next Generation, that time is now here. The traditional insurance market has properly hardened…
Fifth-generation (5G) wireless technology promises to revolutionise communication and data transmission globally, heralding a new age of connectivity. Recently, circulating conspiracy theories regarding 5G and coronavirus have seen masts attacked and a backlash across social media. Although there is no credence to this fake news, there do appear to be some legitimate concerns with this developing technology, driving changes in…
Global property programme local policies in India will require increased attention as a result of changing tariffs in the Indian insurance market, according to a whitepaper from Willis Towers Watson. The paper notes that while some tariffs were reduced, most have increased as a result of property tariffs issued by the General Insurance Council. The paper, authored by Disha Sahni,…
In a bold move that is hoped to bring some finality to mounting claim numbers, Bayer recently announced it will pay up to $10.9bn to settle the majority of the estimated 125,000 claims alleging Roundup caused their non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. However, this may not be the end of a story with plenty of lessons for risk managers. Since litigation began a…
The unwelcome arrival of coronavirus (Covid-19) has once again shown how essential it is for organisations of all types – private and public – to properly identify, assess, manage and transfer their critical risks. The very fact that we have decided to launch this weekly update on the latest risk and insurance implications of the virus shows that the business…
Employee benefits have become an increasingly hot topic for corporate risk and insurance managers in recent times. This is because companies involved in the European and international economy are fast waking up to the fact that real and lasting success can only be achieved by attracting and retaining the best talent. To do this, they need to offer the best…
The recent outbreak of a novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China has received worldwide attention and is increasingly putting a strain on businesses. On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. The outbreak of any virulent disease presents the trading and shipping industries with various challenges, as was the case with…
In 1996, a 32-year-old woman died of a drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis after flying with a US carrier from Chicago to Hawaii. The Centre for Disease Control traced all 249 passengers and found that six of them, some as far as 13 rows behind the woman, had caught the pathogenic bacterium that causes tuberculosis. As a result of this incident,…