Background information and data description

• Author: European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EU body or agency)
• Pages: 84-86

6. BACKGROUND INFORMATION AND DATA

DESCRIPTION

OVERVI EW AND DATA (RE)

INSURANCE SECTOR

EIOPA publishes statistics based on quantitative Solven-

cy II reporting from insurance undertakings and groups

in the European Union and the European Economic Area

(EEA). These statistics are published on aquarterly basis.

Every publication is accompanied by anote describing

the key aspects of the statistics published. The tables

and charts are available in PDF and Excel format and are

based on information from the statistics at the publica-

tion date.94

The new supervisory regime Solvency II came into full

force on 1 January 2016 as aresult of timely preparation

and appropriate transitional p eriods.

The Solvency II Directive (Directive 2009/138/EC) intro-

duces advanced solvency requirements for insurers based

on a holistic risk assessment, and imposes new assess-

ment rules for assets and liabilities, which must be as-

sessed at market values .

Currently the following type of information is available:

Indicators based on Individual insurance

undertakings (solo data)

›Quarterly and annual public ation of statistics b ased

on solo prudential reporting data and available on

acountry-by-countr y basis. The number of insurance

undertakings for the full reporting sample is consid-

ered as 2,837.

Indicators based on Insurance groups ( group data)

›Annual publication of key indicators based on group

reporting and available at EEA level from Autumn

2018.

94 https://eiopa.europa.eu/Pages/Financial-st ability-and-crisis-preven-

tion/Insurance-Statistics.aspx

Indicators based on reporting for f‌inancial stability

purposes

Pursuant to Art. 51 Solvency II Directive 2009/138/EC in-

surance companies have to publish annual S olvency and

Financial Condition Reports (SFCR) for groups as well as

solo reports for its Solvency II regulated legal entities

since May 2017. The structure of this Financial Stability

Report covers Q4 2019 and focuses on European (re)

insurance undertakings and groups that repor t regular-

ly under Solvency II. EIOPA bases its analysis mainly on

Quarterly Prudential Reporting Solo (QRS) for Q4 2019.

But as not all templates and/or companies report under

QRS, EIOPA also uses Annual Reporting Solo (ARS) and

Quarterly Financial Stability Reporting Group (QFG) for

some indicators.

Information is provided on dierent sample sizes as some

(re)insurance companies are exempted from quar terly

reporting in accordance with Art. 35 (6). Therefore, the

sample of undertakings is not identical in the annual and

quarterly publications. Each Figure EIOPA uses in this re-

port is hence accompanied by asource mentioning the

sample size and anote on data (if needed).

INSURANCE SECTOR

Solvency II has put in place long term guarantees (LTG) and

transitional measures to ensure an app ropriate treatment

of insurance product s that include long-term guarantees

and facilitate asmooth transition of the new regulatory

framework regime. The LTG measures are apermanent

feature of Solvency II, where as the transitional measures

will be gradually phased out until 2032, by which time the

balance sheet position of insurance companies will be ful-

ly estimated at market value. For aperiod of 16 years after

the start of Solvency II (re)insurance undertakings may

apply the transitional measure on the technical provisions

and the risk-free interest rate.

EUROPEAN INSURANCE AND OCCUPATIONAL PENSIONS AUTHORITY

84