U.S. sanctions laws present complex conflicts with state insurance laws. While state laws govern the timely payment of claims and other insurance practices, U.S. sanctions administered by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s...more
On November 13, 2024, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) amended several insurance-related Frequently Asked Questions (“FAQs”) (61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 68, 69, 102, 103, and 104) as...more
On April 23, 2024, the U.S. Department of Labor (the “DoL”) released its final rule (“Fiduciary Rule”) titled Retirement Security Rule: Definition of an Investment Advice Fiduciary (an “Investment Advice Fiduciary”), which...more
In an important decision, the Delaware Court of Chancery, in In re Multiplan Corp. Stockholders Litigation, 2022 WL 24060 (Del. Ch. Jan. 3, 2022), in denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss, addressed claims against the...more
Special Purpose Acquisition Companies or “SPACs” have emerged as a significant part of the financial and transactional markets. A SPAC is a company with no commercial operations, formed strictly for the purpose of publicly...more
On August 16, 2021, The Connecticut Department of Insurance released its National Survey on Climate Risk in the Insurance Industry. The survey’s main objectives are for insurers to report on climate-related risks and to...more
On May 12, 2021, New Jersey adopted a law requiring insurers issuing policies covering loss or damage to property, including the loss of use and occupancy and business interruption, to provide their insureds with a one page...more
The Connecticut General Assembly passed climate-related risk legislation on June 17, 2021 in a section of its state budget implementation bill, making this legislation the first climate-related risk legislation in the United...more
The New Jersey Assembly is currently considering legislation that would authorize property insurers offering coverage for loss of use and occupancy and business interruption to provide their insureds a rider covering global...more
On May 12, 2021, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy signed into law a bill requiring insurers issuing policies covering loss or damage to property, including the loss of use and occupancy and business interruption, to disclose...more
Both the New Jersey Assembly and Senate recently passed identical legislation that would require insurers offering commercial coverage for loss or damage to property, including business interruption, to provide insureds with...more
On March 16, 2021, the New York Department of Financial Services issued Circular Letter No. 5 “Diversity and Corporate Governance,” which notifies all insurers of the need for increased prioritization of diversity in C-Suite...more
In an effort to help struggling businesses deal with the fall-out from the COVID-19 pandemic, legislatures in Florida, Illinois, Maine and Rhode Island have recently proposed legislation to require insurance carriers to cover...more
Legislatures in New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington have all proposed legislation seeking to curb COVID-19’s impact on businesses in their state. Each state’s proposed legislation essentially prohibits...more
In a very favorable ruling for insurance companies, a federal district court on May 6 held that Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company had not misclassified as an independent contractor (IC) a life insurance agent who...more
Following on the heels of a very favorable decision by a federal appellate court earlier this year that insurance agents for American Family Insurance were not misclassified by the company as independent contractors in a...more
All eyes have been focused on the federal mid-term elections and the impact on the U.S. House and Senate. Post-mortems by the pundits have begun. See Locke Lord’s take on the mid-terms. The divided government in Washington,...more
Locke Lord’s Insurance & Reinsurance Newsletter provides topical snapshots of recent developments in the fast-changing world of insurance. For further information on any of the subjects covered in the newsletter, please...more
Independent insurance sales agents have been treated as independent contractors for decades. But recently, class action lawyers have begun to target insurance companies with claims that insurers have misclassified these sales...more
On May 26, 2015, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld a District Court decision and ruled that the Internal Revenue Service could not impose excise tax on certain wholly-foreign retrocessions...more