A.M. BestTV at MORO: Growing Global Protectionism Undermines Reinsurance

By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Business & Finance Week -- In this A.M.BestTV episode at the Meeting of Reinsurance Officials (MORO) conference in Montreal, insurers and industry leaders said nations that restrict cross-border insurance, manipulate interest rates and react to disasters with short-sighted solutions are limiting insurers' ability to provide a full range of risk solutions. Click on http://www.ambest.com/v.asp?v=moro2418 to view the entire program.

Bill Marcoux, partner, DLA Piper, spoke about why protectionism is such a concern for the industry.

"Protectionism is design to protect the domestic market of a country by excluding or curtailing the ability of insurers from outside the country to operate in it," said Marcoux. "This promotes a major problem for the reinsurance industry, since it is one that operates on a global basis."

Chuck Chamness, president and chief executive officer, NAMIC, discussed how governments are taking a bigger share of the recovery work post-catastrophe.

"As a private insurance market, we think this is a bad trend. Also, governments usually establish this type of recovery after the fact in a very political fashion, and it is very wasteful and inefficient. It does not help people prepare for the next disaster. ... They are building in the same place, and in the same ways. When the next disaster comes, they will often be wiped out in the same way as they were yesterday."

Guillermo Plate, deputy superintendent of insurance, Argentina, highlighted how protectionism has impacted his country.

"Argentina has experienced the negative consequences of protectionism," Plate said. "We have a population that is 33% in poverty, with high inflation and international isolationism. However, we are now starting to work our way out of these negative consequences by re-opening our economy to the reinsurance sector and the international community."

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