Latest Legislation Headlines
All the headlines from our Legislation Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Arkansas Judge OKs Class-Action Status in Marlboro Lights Suit
Oct 24 2013 // A judge in Arkansas has granted class-action status to a lawsuit that claims Philip Morris USA deliberately exaggerated the safety of its Marlboro Lights cigarettes. Attorneys for Philip Morris had argued that any lawsuits...
Missouri Insurance Department Adds Lederer as Property/Casualty Actuary
Oct 24 2013 // The Missouri Department of Insurance announced that Julie Lederer has joined the department as the appointed Missouri property/casualty actuary. Lederer will support the Divisions of Insurance Company Regulation and...
North Carolina Captive Insurance Law Now in Effect
Oct 24 2013 // North Carolina is open for business as a domicile for captive insurance companies. The North Carolina Captive Insurance Act, signed into law on June 19, is now in effect, allowing for the formation of captive insurance...
Federal Court Rules Delaware Business Court’s Private Arbitration Is Unconstitutional
Oct 24 2013 // Delaware’s legal industry suffered a blow when a federal court found on Wednesday the state violated the U.S. Constitution with its novel system of allowing judges to arbitrate private business disputes, which...
Flood Insurance Price Increases Affecting Home Sales
Oct 24 2013 // Rangel Dockery and her husband bought a waterfront house in Florida four months ago, assuming their $2,000-a-year flood-insurance premium would remain about the same. After reading recently about a change in the federal...
Bill to Curb ‘Patent Trolls’ Introduced in Congress
Oct 24 2013 // A U.S. congressman, who has led the charge against frivolous patent infringement lawsuits, introduced a bill on Wednesday to curb the behavior of so-called “patent trolls” but faced criticism that some of the...
After JPMorgan $13B Deal, Banks Seek Protections in Future Bailouts
Oct 24 2013 // As the U.S. government closes in on a $13 billion settlement with JPMorgan Chase & Co. over its mortgage practices, lawyers specializing in bank mergers are looking for ways to protect their clients from big losses in...
Florida Regulators Disapprove NCCI’s 1% WC Rate Increase Proposal
Oct 23 2013 // Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty today issued an order notifying the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) that its 1-percent proposed annual rate filing increase in Florida’s workers’...
U.S. Unveils Draft of Voluntary Corporate Cybersecurity Standards
Oct 22 2013 // A U.S. bureau on Tuesday unveiled a draft of voluntary standards that companies can adopt to boost cybersecurity – part of an attempt to protect critical industries without setting restrictive and costly...
Illinois Bills Call for Stiffer Penalties for Boating DUI
Oct 22 2013 // Illinois lawmakers are considering a series of measures aimed at making the state’s waterways safer, including a bill that would impose stiffer penalties on people caught operating a boat while intoxicated. The...
Supreme Court Declines Privacy Claim Against Resale of Driving Records
Oct 22 2013 // The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to consider whether a unit of Thomson Reuters Corp. can obtain and sell information on drivers provided by state agencies without violating a federal privacy law. The decision not...
Insurer Plans IPO Despite Not Making Profit Yet
Oct 21 2013 // NMI Holdings Inc., the mortgage guarantor backed by Kyle Bass, Carlyle Group LP and BlueMountain Capital Management LLC, is seeking to be the first U.S. insurer since 2009 to file an initial public offering without posting...
Insurer Complaints
Oct 21 2013 // It’s no surprise that claims handling ranks in the top 10 when it comes to insurer complaints, but producer licensing issues also appear to be a top grievance. According to a new report by Waltham, Mass.-based...
Is Private Market an Option for Florida Flood Insurance?
Oct 21 2013 // With thousands of Florida homeowners facing significant increases in their federal flood insurance premiums, state lawmakers are considering ways to open up the market to private insurers. Industry experts, however, say...
Florida Enters Era of Workers’ Compensation Market Stability
Oct 21 2013 // Florida’s workers’ compensation system has reached a rare state of rate stability, according to insurers and officials. The agency, the National Council on Compensation Insurance, filed for a one percent...
Louisiana High Court Strikes Down Immigrant Driver Law
Oct 18 2013 // The Louisiana Supreme Court has struck down a state law that made it a crime for people who aren’t U.S. citizens to drive here without carrying proof of their immigration status. The divided court ruled that the...
Kansas Judge Says Test in DUI Case Can Be Suppressed
Oct 18 2013 // A Douglas County judge has ruled that a blood test from a DUI case in Lawrence, Kan., will be suppressed, rejecting the state’s argument that the test was lawful. Douglas County District Judge Kay Huff granted Julian...
Florida Highway Trooper Wants Name Cleared in Lawmaker Ticketing Case
Oct 18 2013 // A Florida Highway Patrol trooper who got in trouble over giving breaks to state legislators wants an appeals court to clear his name. An attorney for Trooper Charles Swindle said that Swindle was appealing to the 1st...
Allianz CEO Says New Regulation to Create Room for Acquisitions
Oct 17 2013 // Allianz SE’s CEO Michael Diekmann said tougher financial regulation will create takeover opportunities for Europe’s biggest insurer. “If Solvency II and Basel III mean more capital, then it’s hard...
Connecticut Announces Its 3rd Licensed Captive Insurance Company
Oct 16 2013 // Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy announced last week that the corporate owner of one of the largest grocery store chains in New York City is setting up its captive insurance subsidiary in Connecticut. The Red Apple Group,...
