In September 2017, the European Union and the United States executed a bilateral treaty called the US-EU Covered Agreement, which for the first time ever permitted US ceding insurers to receive 100% credit on their statutory...more
For more than a decade US insurance regulators have required certain insurers to file climate risk disclosure reports. In recent years, financial regulators in Europe have begun climate change scenario testing while still...more
The climate change landscape for insurers has changed dramatically this past month. There are multiple developments insurers should keep in mind – and not just the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) recent adoption...more
3/18/2024
/ Climate Change ,
Corporate Governance ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ,
Insurance Industry ,
NAIC ,
New Rules ,
Popular ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Regulation ,
State Legislatures
SEC CLIMATE FINANCIAL RISK DISCLOSURE: RELEASE OF THE AGENCY’S REVISED REGULATION?
At some point in October 2023, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is expected to release the long-awaited final version of its...more
With most state legislatures now finished with their 2023 sessions and with the East and West coasts preparing for peak hurricane and wildfire season, respectively, now is a good time to take stock of the environmental,...more
Given the vast number of proposals to close “the protection gap” offered by regulators, reinsurers, insurers, brokers and other industry participants in recent years, it is a wonder that it persists. But to many observers, it...more
The concept of “control” of insurers received significant attention from state insurance regulators last year and will receive even more in 2023. We wrote a brief report in April 2022 following the New York Department of...more
2/7/2023
/ Acquisitions ,
Banking Sector ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Insurance Industry ,
Insurance Regulations ,
Investment Management ,
Investors ,
NAIC ,
New York ,
NYDFS ,
Private Equity ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Shareholder Rights
This update highlights some of the most noteworthy climate change-related federal and state regulatory, judicial and other developments of the past few months, and offers insights that may help guide insurers in their...more
12/12/2022
/ Climate Change ,
Department of Defense (DOD) ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
FDIC ,
FIO ,
Government Entities ,
Insurance Industry ,
NASA ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Regulatory Requirements ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
State and Local Government
This year started off with a surge of enthusiasm among US proponents of increased climate-related financial risk disclosure by insurers and others:
- Soon after the late-2021 Conference of the Parties (COP) 26 event in...more
In our report published on April 26, 2022, we discussed the New York Department of Financial Services’ (NYDFS) Circular Letter No. 5 in which it reminded the industry that acquiring less than 10% of an insurer’s voting...more
5/6/2022
/ Corporate Counsel ,
Corporate Governance ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Documentation ,
Holding Companies ,
Insurance Industry ,
NAIC ,
New York ,
NYDFS ,
Private Equity ,
Reinsurance Agreements ,
Working Groups
On April 27, members from McDermott’s ESG, Impact & Sustainability Group, including Counsel David Cifrino and Partners Thomas Dawson, Carl Fleming and Jacob Hollinger, hosted a webinar on risks, opportunities and disclosures...more
If anyone believed that the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) release of proposed climate change-related disclosure requirements last month might have been an isolated matter, of immediate importance only to the...more
On April 19, 2022, the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) issued Circular Letter No. 5, reminding owners and potential purchasers of shares of insurance companies that acquiring less than 10% of the company’s...more
After a variety of promises concerning climate change-related regulatory development activity last year, forward movement has been relatively slow. The leading exception has been the New York Department of Financial Services...more
4/1/2022
/ Attestation Requirements ,
Climate Change ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ,
Insurance Industry ,
Materiality ,
NAIC ,
NYDFS ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
State Legislatures
The US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) recently proposed landmark climate-related disclosure rules draw attention to a broad scientific consensus that to avert catastrophic consequences from climate change, the...more
3/29/2022
/ Business Opportunities ,
Carbon Emissions ,
Climate Change ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Energy Sector ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ,
Insurance Industry ,
Investors ,
Net Zero ,
Publicly-Traded Companies ,
Risk Management ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Webinars
For much of the past 10 years, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) and individual state insurance regulators have highlighted their awareness of the increasing number of insurers controlled by private...more
The insurance industry was front and center before, during and after the first days of the United Nations’ (UN) climate change summit, Conference of the Parties (COP26), in Glasgow, Scotland, which concluded earlier this...more
11/19/2021
/ Climate Change ,
COP ,
Environmental Justice ,
Environmental Policies ,
Financial Institutions ,
Insurance Industry ,
Mandatory Reporting Laws ,
NAIC ,
Net Zero ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Risk Factors ,
United Nations
There are less than two months before world leaders meet in Glasgow for the UN-sponsored Climate Change summit known as the Conference of the Parties (COP 26). This summer, we have been inundated with dire reports about...more
9/14/2021
/ Climate Change ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Dodd-Frank ,
Environmental Policies ,
Federal Insurance Office ,
Flood Insurance ,
FSOC ,
Joe Biden ,
NAIC ,
New Regulations ,
NYDFS ,
ORSA ,
Risk Assessment ,
Risk Mitigation ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
U.S. Treasury ,
United Nations
US President Joe Biden’s May 20, 2021, executive order laid out an aggressive, whole-of-government plan to address climate change risk, including a set of directives that will have a major impact on the operations of the...more
When we published our last climate change update earlier this month, it was probably a safe bet that the last few weeks of the month would continue to be active. That was an understatement. Before summarizing the New York...more
In the few short weeks since our last report on climate change and the US insurance industry, the volume of climate change news has been extraordinarily high. The range of developments has been broad to say the very...more
At the beginning of the year, we published a short report on the surge in year-end insurance regulatory activity concerning climate change risks (available here). January was another busy month, and we report below on...more
2/17/2021
/ Bermuda ,
Biden Administration ,
Canada ,
Climate Change ,
Commercial Insurance Policies ,
EU ,
Insurance Regulations ,
Popular ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Risk Factors ,
UK ,
United States
In late November 2020, we published a high-level review of insurance regulatory developments relating to climate change, available here. In the six weeks since, regulators and industry participants on both sides of the...more
1/5/2021
/ Climate Change ,
Compliance ,
Corporate Governance ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
EIOPA ,
EU ,
Financial Regulatory Agencies ,
IAIS ,
Insurance Industry ,
ORSA ,
Proposed Amendments ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Risk Management ,
Sustainable Finance ,
Underwriting
There has been a marked increase in public announcements from regulators in recent months, both in the United States and internationally, relating to climate change and about embedding consideration of climate change-related...more
The US Department of the Treasury (Treasury) published an official notice on November 10, 2020, seeking comments from interested parties on proposed new rules promulgated under the latest version of the Terrorism Risk...more