On 14 June 2010, the European Commission published a consultation document on the options for dealing with short selling. We have reported previously on the CESR report on short selling published in March 2010 (click here for our post). …
Read More European Commission Consults on Short Selling

In the annual Mansion House Speech on 16 June 2010, the UK Chancellor announced his intention to abolish the tri-partite system of financial regulation established by the former Labour government. …
Read More UK Chancellor Sets Out Proposals for Reform of Financial Services Regulation

The Association of British Insurers (the ABI) has recently published a consultation paper on its statement of best practice for critical illness cover. Please click here to view the consultation paper. The ABI originally published the statement in 1999 following a report by the Office of Fair Trading on health insurance. The aim of the statement is to ensure that customers continue to get meaningful, understandable and affordable critical illness cover that meets their needs. …
Read More UK: The Association of British Insurers Consults on Statement of Best Practice for Critical Illness Cover

On 29 April 2010, European Advocate General Kokott gave her opinion in the case of Akzo Nobel Chemicals Ltd & Akcros Chemicals Ltd v European Commission. She was asked to consider whether “the protection of communications between lawyers and their clients (‘legal professional privilege’), guaranteed as a fundamental right under the law of the European Union, also extended to internal exchanges of opinions and information between the management of an undertaking and an ‘enrolled in-house lawyer’ employed by that undertaking?” …
Read More EU: European Advocate General Opinion Concludes No Privilege for In-house Lawyers

In Farid Yeganeh v Zurich Plc and Zurich Insurance Company 2009 Folio 244, the High Court found that Zurich did not have to pay any compensation to Mr Yeganeh as he had breached a condition of his insurance policy by making fraudulent claims for property lost in a house fire. …
Read More UK: High Court Refuses Compensation for Exaggerated Claim

The Financial Services Authority (the FSA) has recently announced a temporary rule which will allow customers with complaints about the purchase of a payment protection insurance (PPI) policy more time within which to refer it to the Financial Ombudsman Service (the FOS). This temporary rule has been introduced without consultation. …
Read More UK: The Financial Services Authority Introduces Temporary PPI Rule

MP Jonathan Djanogly, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of Justice, has confirmed to Parliament that the new Government will not seek to overturn the House of Lords’ decision that asymptomatic pleural plaques were not compensatable. He also confirmed that the Government would “proceed with the implementation of the previously announced limited extra-statutory scheme to provide one-off payments to individuals who had begun, but not resolved, a legal claim for compensation for pleural plaques at the time of the House of Lords judgment.” …
Read More UK: New Government Confirms Labour’s Pleural Plaques Decision

Recently, a Pennsylvania federal court dismissed a bad faith claim against an insurer on the grounds that the claim was subsumed by the plaintiff’s breach of contract claim in the same proceeding. …
Read More Pennsylvania Federal Court Dismisses Bad Faith Claim as Subsumed by Breach of Contract Claim, But Allows Statutory Bad Faith Claim

The 2011 Rhode Island state budget, which was enacted as HB 7397A and signed into law June 2, 2010, amends the taxation statutes applicable to surplus lines insurers and the Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriters Association.  Article 9 of HB 7397A contains both amendments. …
Read More Rhode Island 2011 Budget – Tax Implications for Surplus Lines Insurers and Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriters Association

The Commercial Court has upheld an arbitration award on business interruption insurance that used a “but for” approach to causation with the effect of limiting recovery by the insured. …
Read More UK: Commercial Court Upholds Tribunal Award Limiting Recovery Under Business Interruption Policy