On December 5, the Insurance, Housing and Community Opportunity Subcommittee of the House Committee on Financial Services approved H.R. 3559. 3559 addresses a sensitive issue regarding the proposed power of the Federal Insurance Office (FIO) and the Office of Financial Research (OFR) – maintaining confidentiality and privilege on information shared by insurers to governmental bodies not currently within the customary scope of disclosure by insurers. These federal agencies would not have the authority, in the first instance, to subpoena information directly from insurance companies. Instead, the FIO and OFR would need to obtain information on insurance companies through a procedure specified in the bill, which is described below.
According to the bill, the FIO and OFR would need to reach out to state insurance regulators, any applicable federal regulator and any public sources to determine whether the information is available from such sources. If the information is not available, then the FIO or OFR may collect the information from the insurance company.
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