The International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) concluded its 2015 Annual General Meeting in Marrakech, following meetings during which it finalised numerous projects and adopted several strategic and technical papers, including revisions to the IAIS Insurance Core Principles (ICPs).
During its Committee and General Meetings, the IAIS adopted the following supervisory and supporting material:
• The Higher Loss Absorbency (HLA) Requirement, a development of the initial version of the HLA concluded in October when it was endorsed by the IAIS Executive Committee and the Financial Stability Board. The HLA has now been adopted by the full IAIS membership and is expected to be endorsed by the G20 later this month.
• Revisions to the ICPs, namely ICP 4 (Licensing), ICP 5 (Suitability of Persons), ICP 7 (Corporate Governance), ICP 8 (Risk Management and Internal Controls), ICP 23 (Group-wide Supervision) and ICP 25 (Supervisory Cooperation and Coordination).
• Application Paper on the Regulation and Supervision of Captive Insurers, which provides guidance to insurance supervisors on the application of aspects of regulation and supervision specifically relevant to captive insurers or reinsurers.
• Issues Paper on Conduct of Business Risk and its Management, which aims to raise awareness of conduct of business risk and covers conduct of business risk and its impact, sources of conduct risks, conduct risk management and the supervisor’s role. It also discusses the interlinkages with, and complementary approaches to, prudential risk management and supervision.
• Issues Paper on Conduct of Business in Inclusive Insurance, developed to take stock of the issues of fair treatment of the inclusive insurance customer or the customer of microinsurance products. It extensively describes the features of the inclusive insurance market, discusses the various elements of the inclusive insurance life cycle and presents issues that have been identified from a conduct of business perspective that are relevant to the fair treatment of the inclusive insurance customer.
• Issues in Regulation and Supervision of Microtakaful. The paper, jointly developed with the Islamic Financial Services Board, provides regulatory and supervisory authorities and industry representatives with insights on the types of issues that arise from microtakaful practices.
Executive Committee elections
The IAIS also held Executive Committee elections, at which Dr Victoria Saporta, the Director of Financial Policy of the Prudential Regulation Authority at the Bank of England, was elected Chair. Dr Saporta succeeds Mr Felix Hufeld, who stepped down due to his appointment in March as President at the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin).
The Executive Committee now comprises 27 members, of which two (Messrs Hassan Boubrik of Morocco and Ebrahim Al Zaabi of the UAE) are from the MENA region.