...Ratings Unaffected by Changes: Fitch Ratings believes the significant changes to international regulations are likely to be neutral for European insurance group ratings. Global systemically important insurers (G-SIIs) and internationally active insurance groups (IAIGs) generally have strong capitalisation and risk management. Any additional requirements not yet defined could well be covered without further capital resources. However, they could have a detrimental impact on cost of capital and competitiveness. Regulatory Burden Increasing: Fitch believes the increased focus on international regulation, and closer supervision of affected insurers should lead to further improvements in risk management. However, we believe large European insurers are already well regulated and generally have well established, strong risk-management frameworks. Incremental gains could therefore be offset, or even outweighed, by the extra costs of the increased regulatory burden. Distinguishing Insurers from...
