First Ever: Global Capital Standards For Insurers

The IAIS announced that by late 2014 it will have finalized and made ready for implementation "straightforward, backstop capital requirements" for insurers that are designated as global systemically important insurers.

On October 9, 2013, the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) took a significant step toward developing a first-ever risk-based global insurance capital standard (ICS). The target date for development of the ICS is 2016, with full implementation beginning in 2019 after two years of testing and refinement.

Peter Braumüller, chair of the IAIS Executive Committee, said: "[i]t is undeniable that the business of insurance is global, and global issues demand global responses" and that "[t]his is why the IAIS, whose Members constitute nearly all of the world's insurance supervisors, has committed to develop and implement the first-ever risk based global insurance capital standard." In the official IAIS press release, Michael T. McRaith,