Goldberg Segalla, Author at The Insurance & Reinsurance Report

March 12, 2018 Cyberinsurance / Directors and Officers

First of its Kind: Yahoo Settles Securities Litigation for $80 Million

Yahoo’s recently-announced $80 million settlement of its data breach-related securities lawsuit may be a signal that the plaintiffs’ bar is going to pivot away from pursuing these claims in the form of shareholder derivative lawsuits. In their ongoing effort to capitalize on large-scale data breaches, to date, plaintiffs have struggled to survive motions to dismiss in data breach-related derivative lawsuits (e.g. Target and Wyndham Worldwide). Although the plaintiffs in the Home Depot derivative litigation were able to extract a $1.125 million settlement while the dismissal …

March 5, 2018 General

Current Events in Insurance Coverage — Reflections on ABA TIPS ICLC Meeting

The ABA Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section’s Insurance Coverage Litigation Committee’s mid-year meeting is always a great opportunity to learn about emerging issues and recent developments in coverage law and to meet with leaders of the insurance industry and insurance coverage bar. This year’s meeting was no exception.

I attended the meeting, where I led a panel discussion on emerging issues in D&O and Professional Liability coverage law. The panel, made up of thought leaders from the insurance brokerage, policyholder’s insurance recovery bar and …

January 23, 2018 Regulatory

Is the Joint Decision to Withdraw Met Life’s SIFI Designation a Hobson’s Choice?

With the consent of the Trump Administration, on Thursday, January 18, 2018, the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), a Federal government organization established by Title I of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act during the Obama administration, and MetLife jointly filed a motion with in the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. FSOC empowers the government to designate non-banks as SIFI’s, which subjects them to heightened supervisory requirements by the Federal Reserve.

The motion effectively ends a nearly two-year …

January 17, 2018 Regulatory

ACI Brexit Panel Preview: Four Key Issues for International Insurers

On March 8, 2018, at the 14th ACI National Forum on Insurance Regulation in New York City, I’ll be participating in a panel discussion on Brexit and its implications for the global insurance community. With Brexit’s implementation over a year away and many details left to be decided, insurance professionals and their legal counsel have been left with little more than speculation on the unprecedented event’s effects on their industry. Some central issues and concerns, however, are crystalizing. The following are a few of the …

November 22, 2017 Automobile Coverage / Regulatory

Changes to New York State Insurance Law Affect Auto Policies, Neonatal Intensive Care Coverage, and Exposures for Mortgage Guaranty Insurers

Frederick J. Pomerantz, a partner in Goldberg Segalla’s Global Insurance Services and Insurance Regulatory Practice Groups, has authored three alerts on changes to New York State insurance regulations in the November 2017 edition of the Federation of Regulatory Counsel (FORC) Alerts. In the alerts, Fred details notable recent changes pertaining to private passenger auto policies, neonatal intensive care services, and exposures for mortgage guaranty insurers.

Analysis of Non-Renewals of Private Passenger Auto Policies

Effective October 23, 2017, Section 1, Paragraph 2 of Subsection (l) …

November 17, 2017 Excess Insurance

Massachusetts Court Holds that All Excess Policies are Created Equal

In Massachusetts, competing excess insurance policies will apply equally to provide excess coverage even if one policy is a true excess policy and the other is a hybrid policy that provides either primary or excess coverage depending on the circumstances. See Great Divide Ins. Co. v. Lexington Ins. Co., 2017 WL 4969942 (Mass. Nov. 1, 2017). In a November 1, 2017 opinion, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts held that the plain language of the insurance policies was the determinative factor in establishing priority of …

November 13, 2017 Cyberinsurance

The Modern Fraudster: How Courts Are Responding to Social Engineering Fraud

In an article for Insurance Journal, Goldberg Segalla partner Jonathan L. Schwartz and associate Colin B. Willmott, members of the Global Insurance Services Practice Group in the firm’s Chicago office, write about social engineering fraud (SEF) and questions over availability of insurance coverage for SEF under commercial crime policies — an issue the Second and Sixth Circuit Courts of Appeals are set to clarify in 2018.

SEF includes now-common types of fraud involving digital communications: phishing/whaling, spoofing, and impersonating or pretexting. “A common …

September 29, 2017 Bad Faith and Extra-Contractual Liability

Pennsylvania Supreme Court Rules that Bad Faith Does Not Require Proof of an Insurer’s Self-Interest or Ill-Will

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled today that the Pennsylvania bad faith statute does not require a plaintiff to prove that an insurer was motivated by self-interest or ill-will when denying benefits under an insurance policy. Instead, the court’s decision in Rancosky v. Washington National Insurance Company adopted the standard established by the Pennsylvania Superior Court 23 years ago in Terletsky v. Prudential Property & Casualty Company, under which a bad faith claim is established by clear and convincing evidence

that the insurer did not

September 12, 2017 Regulatory

DFS Partially Clarifies Who Qualifies for an Exemption Under Cybersecurity Regulation

By the terms of 23 NYCRR 500.19(e), Covered Entities that have determined they qualify for a limited exemption from compliance under 23 NYCRR 500.19(a)-(d) of New York’s new Cybersecurity Regulation — as of August 28, 2017 — are required to file a Notice of Exemption with the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) on or prior to September 28, 2017.

The first compliance date of August 28, 2017 in New York’s cybersecurity regulation, and the date for Covered Entities to determine whether they qualify …

September 12, 2017 Reinsurance

“Twisting in the Wind: Covered Agreement Dangling by Uncertainty and Politics,” AIRROC Matters

In an article for AIRROC Matters, Frederick J. Pomerantz examines the uncertain status of the “Covered Agreement,” a novel multilateral insurance agreement between the United States and the European Union. Early advocates hoped that the agreement would result in an “equivalency recognition” between U.S. and EU insurance regulatory systems. According to state insurance regulators, the agreement falls short of this, but does include provisions that would bring these insurance markets closer by eliminating obstacles for U.S. reinsurers doing business in the EU and by …