European insurance groups are the largest institutional investors in Europe's financial markets and have a significant role in long term investment globally.

Solvency II is the new European prudential regulatory regime for insurers due to come into force on 1 January 2016. The new regime takes a completely different approach to regulation from the current regime and, in particular, in relation to the investments backing insurers' liabilities and capital requirements. Instead of prescribing admissible assets and counterparty and asset limits as is the case currently, it adopts a more permissive "prudent investor regime" but, also introduces a system of stress testing asset valuations, effectively resulting in capital charges on the insurer for holding different types of assets depending on the risks inherent in that asset. Fund managers and others hoping to attract insurance company investors should be aware of structures and investments likely to be attractive to insurance company clients in this respect.

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Presenter:
Clare Swirski
Corporate Partner, Financial Institutions Group
Clifford Chance LLP

Clare Swirski is a corporate partner in the Financial Institutions Group at Clifford Chance with over 18 years' experience in corporate work including mergers and acquisitions, listings, group re-organisations and joint ventures. She provides regulatory, corporate and commercial advice to insurers, banks, fund managers and other financial institutions including transactional advice on mergers and acquisitions, reinsurance and risk transfer and solvency and regulatory capital issues under the current regime and under Solvency II. Clare is a member of the City Lawyers group on Solvency II and is rated Band 1 in Chambers and a leading individual in Legal 500.

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This presentation does not constitute legal advice and should not be relied upon for any purpose. Clifford Chance makes no warranty or representation as to the accuracy of any information contained herein.