Ioannis Rokas – författare

The book addresses a topic at the intersection of two heavily regulated sectors: insurance and investment services. Until recently, scholars and professionals have approached insurance and investment services as two separate categories in the financial services sector, and as being governed by separate regulatory frameworks. In practice, however, the boundaries were and are blurred, a reality that regulators have begun to recognize and address in their more recent regulatory texts.

The first part of the book approaches the new standards applicable to investment products based on insurance: insurance-based investment products (IBIPs). These rules are harmonized across the EU. The rationale behind this new definition is provided, together with a description of these products’ limitations. The analysis addresses the new rules and explores the legal regime and relevant standards applicable to IBIPs. The organizational rules concerning the design and distribution of IBIPsare also examined, and the book highlights e.g. how these rules are inspired by the principles of conduct. In closing, the ADR systems are analysed, in order to ascertain whether or not they can offer an effective tool for settling disputes over these products.

In turn, the second part focuses on the liability for distribution of IBIPs, which ranks as one of the most conspicuous and relatively new legal phenomena, but at the same time, represents an exceptionally important field of civil liability in today’s world. Liability is still regulated at the national level. Thus, the four largest life insurance markets in the EU are considered, along with the largest emerging market for life insurance. The chapters on national laws also consider whether, and if so, how the new harmonized rules on IBIPs are being combined with those already in force in the jurisdictions considered. The goal is to determine whether the new rules are likely to change the doctrine and case law approach tothese products, or whether the European legislators’ choices have no real impact on the protection of clients.

This book adopts an international perspective to examine how the online sale of insurance challenges the insurance regulation and the insurance contract, with a focus on insurance sales, consumer protection, cyber risks and privacy, as well as dispute resolution. Today insurers, policyholders, intermediaries and regulators interact in an increasingly online world with profound implications for what has up to now been a traditionally operating industry. While the growing threats to consumer and business data from cyber attacks constitute major sources of risk for insurers, at the same time cyber insurance has become the fastest growing commercial insurance product in many jurisdictions.

Scholars and practitioners from Europe, the United States and Asia review these topics from the viewpoints of insurers, policyholders and insurance intermediaries. In some cases, existing insurance regulations appear readily adaptable to the online world, such as prohibitions on deceptive marketing of insurance products and unfair commercial practices, which can be applied to advertising through social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, as well as to traditional written material. In other areas, current regulatory and business practices are proving to be inadequate to the task and new ones are emerging.  For example, the insurance industry and insurance supervisors are exploring how to review, utilize, profit from and regulate the explosive growth of data mining and predictive analytics (“big data”), which threaten long-standing privacy protection and insurance risk classification laws.