TRIA, Military Sales Bill Markups Set In House Panel
By Arthur D. Postal, Washington Bureau Chief
NU Online News Service, Sept. 21, 4:16 p.m. EDT?Rep. Mike Oxley, R-Ohio, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said today that on Sept. 29 his committee will markup and send to the House floor bills extending the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act for two years and imposing greater restrictions on sale of insurance on military bases.[@@]
The TRIA bill to be marked up by the panel will include a provision including group life, but the group life industry?especially companies with both property-casualty and group life units?are voicing concerns because the bill being supported by the committee's Republican leadership does not create a separate pool for group life companies and/or affiliates. Group life lobbyists were told this yesterday by majority staffers of the House Financial Services panel.
According to industry officials in Washington, D.C. familiar with the legislation, the fact the leadership, and, apparently, the White House, want a clean bill with no separate pool for group life will raise the amount of loss that the companies must pay before federal help kicks in.
Group life industry officials were so concerned that the heads of group life units scheduled a "fly-in" to Washington, D.C. to seek support for a separate pool for group life companies from members of Congress and the White House.
The fact that the House panel is marking up the bill means that the debate on extension of TRIA is "heating up," analysts at Prudential Equity Group LLC, said in a note to investors today.
In its note, Prudential Equity analysts said that, a "top industry lobbyist remarked that prospects for extending TRIA (for another two to three years albeit with higher deductibles) by year-end merit odds on a cautious side of a tossup."
"Passage in the House appears more likely than in the Senate, although Senate passage
passage could be achieved if the TRIA extension is attached to an omnibus spending bill," according to Charles Gabriel, Prudential Equity Group's
Senior Washington Analyst.
Prudential Equity analysts said that an extension of TRIA would be a "positive catalyst for P&C insurer stocks because it would provide high-level balance sheet protection for commercial insurers."
Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, has indicated that he wants to hold a hearing on the issue next year before voting. Whether he might be persuaded to allow something through this year may become clearer when Sen. Shelby holds an afternoon hearing on insurance issues tomorrow.
Regarding military sales, Rep. Oxley said Tuesday that the markup vehicle would be legislation proposed earlier this month by Rep. Max Burns, R-Ga. That legislation clarifies that state regulators have authority over sales of insurance at military bases within their states, requires increased disclosure from agents selling insurance on military bases and bars contract mutual funds.
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