(p1) - Cardiss Collins, Chair (D-IL) - Today's hearing will examine the role of insurance rating companies.
As consumers become increasingly concerned about the solvency and financial stability of their insurance companies, the rating companies will play an even more important role.
Yet, questions have been raised about rating companies in the aftermath of the failures of Executive Life last spring and Mutual Benefit Life last summer.
Both life insurance companies were highly rated by rating companies until shortly before their collapse.
Today, we expect to learn the reasons why some of the rating companies were slow in pointing out the problems with Executive Life and Mutual Benefit Life and what they have done to improve their rating systems.
Ratings were a key feature in the enormous growth of Executive Life before its failure.
(p2) - Cardiss Collins - And on June 18, 1990, Fred Carr testified before Chairman Dingell's Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, which was looking into the problems at Executive Life. <Government Hearings - WishList>
House - Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Commerce, Consumer Protection, and Competitiveness
1992 0218 - GOV (Senate) - Causes and Implications of Insurance Company Failures, CSPAN - Executive Life Insurance Failure, Donald W. Riegle, Jr. (D-MI)
⇒ on the Concerns about the Financial Condition of the Insurance Industry, the Adequacy of Regulatory Supervision, as Well as the Sufficiency of Policyholder Protection Provided by Insurance Guarantee Funds
1992 0218 - GAO - Insurance Regulation: The Failures of Four Large Life Insurers, Testimony Before the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs United States Senate, Statement of Richard L. Fogel, Assistant Comptroller General, General Government Programs - 21p
John Garamendi, California Insurance Commissioner - Testimony - 5p
Senate - Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs
1992 0409 and 0909 - GOV (House) - Insurance Company Failures, John Dingell (D-MI)
(p19) - John C. Dugan Deputy Assistant Secretary Of The Treasury, DOTT, Financial Institutions Policy
(p24) - Many of the new products developed by insurance companies were designed to attract customers looking for a competitive market rate of return on investment, but as a consequence these products such as universal life policies, single premium deferred annuities, and guaranteed investment contracts - were sensitive to changes in interest rates, and posed unfamiliar hazards to the companies that issued them.
At the same time, the proliferation of financial instruments provided a new range of potential investments for the insurance companies themselves, some of which such as high-yield or " junk" bonds were poorly understood by some company managements .
1992 0429 - CBO - CBO Testimony - Statement of James L. Blum, Deputy Director - Congressional Budget Officebefore the Subcommittee on Policy Research and Insurance Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs U. S. House of Representatives - 54p
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate this opportunity to appear before your Subcommittee to give you some preliminary findings from the *report that weare preparing at your request on the economic impact of possible solvency problems in the insurance industry.
Our report does not evaluate the likelihood of solvency problems in the industry.
It hypothetically assumes that such problems could exist on a large enough scale to have noticeable impacts on the overall economy, and then lays out what these macroeconomic impacts might be.
The focus is not on the economic impacts of the event that precipitated the problems in the first place, such as a natural disaster, but on what additional impacts may arise solely from solvency problems in the insurance industry.
*Report - 1994 04 - CBO - The Economic Impact of a Solvency Crisis in the Insurance Industry - 80p
1991 03 - GOV (House Report) - Descriptive Analysis of the Insurance Industry in the United States
House - Committee On Banking, Finance And Urban Affairs - Subcommittee On Policy Research And Insurance
1992 0506 - GOV (House) - Secondary Market for Commercial Real Estate Loans, Ben Erdreich (D-AL)
[PDF-p-GooglePlay]
(p1) - Chairman Ben ERDREICH (D-AL). We will call the subcommittee to order. Last July 31 , this subcommittee held the first in a series of hearings on Asset Securitization and Secondary Markets as part of its oversight and jurisdictional responsibility over secondary markets other than housing. Today, we continue this series of hearings, focusing on recent developments in the area of commercial mortgage securitization and the potential for a viable, secondary market for commercial real estate loans.
The precipitous drop in prices has resulted in little or no new financing for commercial development.
A recent survey by the American Council of Life Insurance reveals that new originations of commercial mortgages by life insurers have declined from $22 billion in 1989, to $ 6.3 billion in 1991.
Given this difficult environment, it's especially noteworthy that the RTC recently concluded two securitized transactions collateralized by commercial mortgages and is about to complete a third.
While these transactions may not be prototypes designed for private issuers to imitate, some market observers are optimistic about the potential for greater commercial mortgage securitization.
They cite the RTC's role in educating investors about commercial mortgage-backed securities and providing a benchmark security in the marketplace.
House - Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs - Subcommittee on Policy Research and Insurance
1992 0623 - GOV (Senate) - Consumer Disclosure of Insurance, Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) --- [BonkNote]