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International News

Saudis may work longer, pay more to Kingdom’s pension fund: Report

The government — faced with an estimated actuarial gap of 800 billion riyals ($213 billion) at the state-controlled pension fund — is weighing proposals to increase the retirement age, according to three people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified to discuss confidential deliberations. It could also require workers to contribute more of their salaries to the General Organization for Social Insurance, or GOSI, which manages both public and private sector pensions, the people said.

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Global financial regulators attempt to align rules on climate risks

The Financial Stability Board (FSB), which coordinates financial rules for the G20 group of nations, said its “roadmap” seeks to coordinate approaches to disclosures by companies and plug gaps in the data needed to spot financial stability “vulnerabilities” and develop tools to address them.

The roadmap attempts to align rules still in the planning stage between now and 2023 to avoid more divergences between various measures for the same activity.

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Swiss Re’s Nina Arquint receives `The 2021 Geneva Association Women in Insurance Award”

Jad Ariss, Managing Director of The Geneva Association, said: “I congratulate Nina Arquint on winning this award, which recognises her leadership role in reducing the underwriting of coal, the most polluting and carbon-intensive fuel, and her great dedication to tackling environmental risks. Ms Arquint and her team have made demonstrable contributions to reducing the financial viability of coal and contributing to accelerating its phase-out globally. This work is in alignment with The Geneva Association’s mission to promote the use of insurance to create a better, more resilient, and more sustainable world.” 

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Gibraltar Japan partners with Munich Re to improve underwriting experience for customers

Seigo Nakano, CIO at Gibraltar Life added: “We have seen an enormous change in the Japanese life insurance market in the past 10 years with the majority of large life insurance firms introducing automated underwriting.
Hiroko Izumisawa, Corporate Vice President at Gibraltar also added: “Our partnership with Munich Re, Japan Branch, allowed us to develop a comprehensive underwriting rule-set which covers over 270 risk factors. It enables us to automatically assess 85% of applications while digitally capturing all application data. We’ve been utilizing the underwriting engine for a couple of months, and so far, customers are reacting favorably to the enhanced application process.”

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Public, not polluters, too often pay to clean up environment, EU auditors say

“Polluters need to pay for the environmental damage they cause,” said report author Viorel Stefan. “Up to now, though, European taxpayers have far too often been forced to bear the costs that polluters should have paid.”

The auditors looked at a sample of 42 environmental clean-up projects, backed by 180 million euros ($214 million) of EU funds, to fix issues like industrial pollution and contaminated landfill sites in Italy, Poland and Portugal.

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U.K. is easing Covid rules, bringing businesses fresh concerns

Ministers highlight the link between infections, hospitalizations and deaths has been weakened by one of the world’s most advanced vaccination programs, yet infections have increased by two-thirds in the past week, fueled by the fast-spreading delta variant.
Tony Danker, director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, said it will be “critical” to build both customer and employee confidence and that the government has a “vital” role to play in providing guidance to employers. The big question remains: Will consumers come back?

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Unveiling its last petrol car, Lotus sets off in pursuit of Porsche

The Emira, which will start at around 60,000 pounds ($83,000), is the first new petrol Lotus model in more than a decade but it will be the last powered by fossil fuels.
Lotus is currently developing an electric sports car platform in partnership with Renault for the French company’s Alpine brand, and that framework will also be available to other carmakers.
Lotus and its Chinese owner Geely want to transform what is now a tiny company making some 1,500 sports cars a year into an electric powerhouse churning out tens of thousands of high-end saloons and sports-utility vehicles (SUVs) as well.

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