'Romania has started to gradually prepare for adjusting to the Solvency II requirements on the insurance sector, and in summer 2013 the European Council is supposed to approve the Solvency II regulations; then, in the third quarter of 2013, the European Parliament is expected to debate with a view to approving the new rules of the Solvency II Directive on the insurance market. The Solvency II Directive is expected to come in force as of January 1, 2014 and the implementation of the Directive in the national legislation of EU member countries will begin in Q3 2014,' Thomas Petr told a conference titled 'Solvency II: Anticipating Challenges, Capturing Benefits,' organized by Deloitte Romania, Bucharest.
Chairman of the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) Gabriel Bernadino considers that there is a high likelihood that 'the implementation of Solvency II is deferred until 2016', given that insurance companies want the European supervisory authority 'to carefully consider the European Commission's request for the revision of the calibration of capital requirements for long-term investments, stressing that it is important that EIOPA has a full picture of the impact such a review will have on the financing of the European economy.'
As concerns the Solvency II Directive, the insurers want an impact survey to be released, which should include tests of the counter-cyclical measures, including the Counter-cyclical Premium, Matching Adjustment (now also for certain non life insurance obligations) and the Extrapolation.
Insurers want EIOPA and the European Commission to use this respite to consider ways to reduce costs under the Solvency II Directive, as well as how the principles of materiality and proportionality can be put into practice.
The European insurers manage assets worth over 7,700 billion euros, representing more than half of European Union's GDP.
