Insights

Why the ECB and EIOPA Are Exploring Actions to Reduce the Climate Insurance Protection Gap

With our finger on the pulse of this ever-evolving industry, we provide intermediaries with practical, cost-effective solutions to address your business needs, from outsourcing, assistance in navigating regulatory landscape developments and their impacts, statutory reporting requirements, to support with mergers and acquisitions.

Grant Thornton’s agile team of operational resilience experts are ready to deliver proven solutions to our clients based on regulatory requirements and their strategic priorities. We leverage our vast industry experience of operational resilience engagements to assist you implement the guidance effectively on a day-to-day basis and to set future plans and strategies.

Following stakeholder consultation, the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI) has published ‘Guidance for (Re)Insurance Undertakings on Climate Change Risk’. The following are the key areas outlined for re(insurers) to integrate climate change risk: Appropriate Governance, Materiality Assessment, Scenario Analysis, Strategy & Business Model, Risk Appetite & Risk Management and Reporting.

Over the last few years the ECB have published a series of guidance and best practice publications in the Climate and Environmental (C&E) risk area. These publications and best industry practices indicate that while banks have made progress in incorporating climate-related risk, there is a high level of inconsistency in certain practices and also areas for improvement.

The Central Bank of Ireland has reminded firms of their obligations to align the governance and oversight of MGA arrangements with the outsourcing requirements set out in Solvency II for Critical or Important Functions or Activities.

The Central Bank of Ireland introduced pre-emptive recovery planning requirements in 2021 and all (re)insurance undertakings have been required to have a recovery plan in place since 31 March 2022. Following submission of the first set of recovery plans by High and Medium-High Impact firms, the Central Bank carried out a thematic review and the main observations were communicated to firms.

Under the fitness and probity (‘F&P’) regime the Central Bank of Ireland (the ‘Central Bank’) assesses the suitability (the fitness and probity) of individuals put forward for a number of senior roles in regulated firms (referred to as pre-approval controlled functions or ‘PCFs’).

The Central Bank published the Cross Industry Guidance on Operational Resilience in December 2021 expecting firms to be in a position to evidence compliance within two years. It has now issued an Operational Resilience Maturity Assessment to firms in all sectors to assess the level of preparedness in the financial services industry.

This is the first article from Grant Thornton in our series on the Central Bank of Ireland (Central Bank)’s recovery plan Requirements. This introductory article provides an overview of the key requirements of the legislation, the timelines involved and main topics included in your recovery plan.

How Grant Thornton can help you understand the challenges surrounding the implementation and validation of machine learning techniques in IRB models.

All regulated financial services providers (RFSPs) with a PRISM impact rating of medium-low or above should now be preparing to submit their first outsourcing register using a new online return. The first submission is due by 31 July 2022.