Insurers expand services as investment income stalls
Lower yields from investments are driving expansion of insurance companies into other services including lending.
MetLife and
AIG are among the US insurers that are increasing their market share in areas such as residential mortgages, car loans and student debt which offer greater returns than the traditional route of buying debt.
“Given the lack of liquidity in the securitized markets, which is how many insurers have previously purchased loans, insurers are now waking up to the reality that it’s better to own the loans directly,” AIG’s chief investment officer Doug Dachille told
Bloomberg.
Some have expressed concern over the ‘shadow banking’ sector in which firms operate like banks but without the same regulation; and although some analysts point to low levels of defaults among insurer-issued loans, others warn that as newer entrants to some areas of lending, insurance firms lack the underwriting experience of traditional lenders.
Report highlights risk, underinsurance of global rangers
The risk faced by the world’s wildlife rangers has been highlighted in a new report which shows a lack of insurance coverage in two continents.
The International Rangers Federation’s data shows that at least 107 rangers died in the past 12 months and over 1000 over the past decade; but many rangers lack even basic insurance cover.
A survey across 40 countries, commissioned by the WWF and the Ranger Federation of Asia, found that 35 per cent of government rangers have no life insurance, 20 per cent have no health cover and 45 per cent are without long-term disability coverage. The situation is even worse in Asia and Africa.
The report calls for NGO’s, governments and the private insurance sector to work together to create new products specifically for rangers who face their greatest risks from poachers and wild animals.
This common practice is damaging employee wellbeing
For insurance businesses and clients, new research on emails could trigger a change of policy in order to protect employees’ wellbeing.
The study - by Liuba Belkin of Lehigh University, William Becker of Virginia Tech and Samantha A. Conroy of Colorado State University – has found a link between the expectation of organizations regarding out-of-work-hours email and emotional exhaustion of employees.
While technology may have been introduced in order to improve the work-life balance of employees, the research suggests it may in fact be harming it.
It’s not about the number of emails or the time taken to respond to them that is the cause of stress, it is the expectation that emails will be dealt with out of normal working hours.
“Organizational expectations can steal employee resources even when actual time is not required because employees cannot fully separate from work," state the authors.
The largest group among the 385 participants in the study were from the financial services sector followed by technology and healthcare.
The authors suggest that organizations that cannot completely ban out-of-hours emailing should try to limit the impact by implementing ‘email free days’ or rotating after-hours emailing schedules.
These policies not only reduce pressure on employees to respond to email in their own time but also suggest a supportive culture which further enhances employee wellbeing.
