Insurance companies are always protecting their bottom line. The goal is to make money, not constantly lose it to claimants. That’s why insurance firms use something called the Catastrophe Loss Index to project the number of insurance claims pending from a natural disaster or other significant event that is pending. The index assigns a number that covers expected losses on housing, automobile, and commercial property policies.
The primary purpose of the CLI is to help firms set capital aside in case of a wave of claims. They also use the CLI to decide the right time and locations to send out their adjusters to verify the submitted claims.
The loss index covers a wide number of natural and manmade disasters, including hurricanes, tropical storms, ice, fire, volcanic eruptions, civil riots, snow, and even explosions.
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Finance: What is Directors & Officers In...100 Views
finance a la shmoop what is directors and officers insurance coverage? well if
you ever sit on the board of a public company you'll want this or at least a [People sat at a table in a meeting]
feeling you'll sleep better at night if you have it. D&O insurance is just
insurance like any other kind of insurance only it insurers for board
stupidity or rather legal definitions of dumb things companies do that costs
shareholders money and for which the Board of Directors then gets blamed and
sued in theory if company ever lost a large lawsuit well at worst they would [Man and woman in a court]
just hand over the keys to the company itself to whoever won the lawsuit
famously warren buffett founder and CEO Berkshire Hathaway and the largest
seller of insurance in the world through Geico and other subsidiaries does not
allow his Board of Directors to carry any D&O insurance because he feels that
if the company stumbles so stupidly because of poor governance that he along [Warren Buffet appears]
with all of his boards should suffer the resulting personal bankruptcies that
would follow with all the lawsuits that would be piled on and yes sometimes
companies are so corrupt or stupid or unlucky that the damages in a lost
lawsuit exceed the value of the entire company itself and then the insurance
company has to be called to cover whatever is left in legal bills after
the company has been handed over in practice it's not quite that dramatic
companies carry D&O insurance for smaller things as well like a company
stock goes from $22 to $14 after a bad quarter and some ambulance-chasing [Company stock graph appears]
lawyer from New York is able to convince a judge that proper disclosure wasn't
made about the lack of sales in the Uzbekistan office and to make the
lawsuit go away the company held hostage pays seventeen million dollars in
damages to shareholders making a claim the key thing is the shareholders here
get like pennies a share and the lawyers get millions a typical D&O policy for a
smaller public company might carry a ten million dollar deductible so in this
case the first ten million of that seventeen comes out of the company
coffers and then the money beyond that comes from the insurance company that
wrote the coverage policy well historically the business of writing D&O
policies has been a great business for the insurance industry as tons of
premiums get paid by nervous Nelly directors who in fact never lose [Hammer nails sign to the wall]
lawsuits and well you know the gravy train keeps on graving... [Man riding a gravy train]
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