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Cannabis Sales Outlook Promising for Insuring Cannabis Specialists

Article 0 Comments A new report shows global legal cannabis spending grew to $36 billion in 2023, and more importantly, that languishing sales in longer-legal states may soon start to swing back up – two big, encouraging signs for insuring cannabis specialists. BDSA, a data provider for the cannabis industry, said this week that sales grew last year, while sales are forecast sales to continue to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 10% from 2023 to 2028, yielding a $58 billion market by 2028. The growth of legal cannabis sales is largely being driven by U.S. markets, fueled by the adult-use channel, according to BDSA. The firm’s data shows that U.S. adult-use markets represent roughly 56% of total global cannabis sales. Mature adult-use markets like California and Colorado have struggled with cannabis price compression and illicit competition, however emerging adult-use markets including Connecticut, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, New York and Illinois, are forecast to see rapid growth to help offset those trends, the report shows. Florida and Pennsylvania are both medical markets, but they are forecast to launch adult-use sales in 2025 and see strong growth out to 2028, according to BDSA. Underlying good news in the report...

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Whole Life Gets More Shopper Attention

The holders can get cash out of either a whole life policy or a universal life policy by selling the policy, withdrawing assets or borrowing against the cash value. MIB: MIB is a Braintree, Massachusetts-based organization that helps life insurers share underwriting information. It bases the monthly shopping statistics on application processing volume. Age breakouts: Here’s how U.S. life application activity changed between February 2023 and the latest month for five age groups: Ages 0-30: +2.5% Ages 31-40: +5.8% Ages 51-60: +0.3% Ages 61-70: +1.6% Ages 71 and older: +8.0% Coverage costs: Policygenius, a web broker, publishes monthly price charts based on the prices that term life issuers offer their customers. The lowest price is for a 25-year-old female nonsmoker who needs $250,000 in death benefits. The highest price is for a 60-year-old male smoker who needs $1 million in death benefits. The cost for the young, female nonsmoker increased to $14.58, from $14.40. The cost for the 60-year-old male smoker is $1,621.84. In 2023, the highest age included in the Policygenius index table was 55. For 55-year-old smokers, the cost of $1 million in coverage fell to $1,006.89, from $1,006.92. Credit: Adobe Stock

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Washington Commissioner Wants Insurers to Modify Claims Process for Wildfire Victims

Article 0 Comments Washington Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler on Wednesday sent a letter to insurers urging them to consider loosening personal property claim filing requirements for victims of last summer’s Spokane County wildfires. Insurance companies typically require policyholders to provide a full, itemized list of all personal property lost in the inciting incident to settle a claim. However, in his letter, Kreidler asked insurers to adjust those requirements and allow for the grouping of like items for consideration, such as listing “six sweaters” rather than an individual size and make for each shirt. “Unlike a normal house fire, a wildfire often completely consumes the residence and all it contains. This means people are unable to sort through the debris to find evidence of personal property loss and must rely on their memory to generate lists,” Kreidler wrote. “These wildfire victims have lost everything in their homes; an itemized list could easily be over 5,000 line items.” Kreidler also asked insurers to consider adopting the same procedure in Washington they use in neighboring states that have experienced devastating wildfire loss: provide people with a percentage of their policy’s total liability limits without requiring an itemized list of losses. Kreidler suggested policyholders...

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Multi-Year Guaranteed Annuity Sales Get Back on the Rocket

U.S. life insurers refilled their tanks of multi-year guaranteed annuity capital in the fourth quarter of 2023. Life insurers let sales of the products rocket up to $53 billion in the quarter, up 48% from the total recorded in the fourth quarter of 2022, after increasing just 13% in the third quarter of 2023, according to a new issuer survey compiled by Wink. MYGA sales growth was especially strong in 2022, thanks to rising interest rates. Complaints about the amount of capital needed to support the products began to bubble up in 2023. Wink survey participants said their total fourth-quarter individual deferred annuity sales increased 33%, year over year, to $105 billion. LIMRA, which conducts a separate survey that includes a wider range of products, says the issuers in its sample increased total U.S. individual annuity sales by 29%, to $115 billion.

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FSI Asks Court to Strike Down DOL Independent Contractor Rule

The Financial Services Institute and its coalition partners filed an amended complaint Tuesday against the Labor Department’s new independent contrator rule, which asks the court to declare the 2024 rule invalid, prohibit its implementation and allows the 2021 independent contractor rule to remain in effect. FSI filed the amended complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas along with the Associated Builders and Contractors, the American Trucking Association, the Coalition for Workforce Innovation, the National Retail Federation, the National Federation of Independent Business and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The complaint states that the 2024 rule, which Labor finalized on Jan. 9, is arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act and also violates the Regulatory Flexibility Act. An FSI spokesperson told ThinkAdvisor Tuesday in an email that the amended complaint replaces the earlier complaint filed on Jan. 16, which challenged DOL’s withdrawal of the 2021 independent contractor rule. The new amended complaint, the spokesperson said, reflects “our concerns with the final DOL rule” and adds new plaintiffs. The department, according to the amended suit, ”has issued a new rule that largely repeats the Department’s previous errors and fails to remedy the confusion addressed by the 2021 Independent Contractor Rule.” The 2024...

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Lloyd’s Hits 35% Female Leadership Target, Says it Has a ‘Way to Go’

Article 0 Comments Lloyd’s of London has hit a short-term target of filling 35% of leadership roles with women, although less than half of firms in the commercial insurance market had hit the mark, it said on Tuesday. Lloyd’s said it needed to make further progress to improve culture after reporting that only 45% of managing agents and brokers had helped propel the diversity figure to its overall end-2023 target. “Whilst we’ve hit our short term target … and the market continues to make progress on representation of diverse groups, we still have a way to go on our culture journey,” Lloyd’s Chief People Officer Sara Gomez said. Lloyd’s set the end-2023 target in 2020 after staff raised concerns about sexual harassment and daytime drinking. In its fifth Market Policies and Practices report, Lloyd’s said the proportion of women in leadership roles rose by 3 percentage points, with improvements at board level, in executive committees and direct reports of executive committees. Lloyd’s, which employs around 57,000 people in insurance and broking firms and is aiming for gender parity by 2030, said women now made up more than 43% of the 57,000-strong workforce and that 46% of new hires were women...

Ontario Financial Services Regulator Encourages Consumers To Verify Credentials With New Online Tool 0

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Ontario Financial Services Regulator Encourages Consumers To Verify Credentials With New Online Tool

Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario (FSRA) launches Check Credentials Tool Toronto, ON (Mar. 1, 2024 – Ontario’s financial services regulator (FSRA) is launching an education campaign encouraging all consumers to check the credentials of the person they are getting financial advice from. FSRA is making it easy for consumers to do this through a new online tool. The Check Credentials Tool will help individuals verify whether their financial professional holds the necessary credentials to use the Financial Planner or Financial Advisor (or similar) title in Ontario. These titles indicate that the professional has met minimum education standards, is supervised, and adheres to a code of conduct. “In many cases people are entrusting their life savings to financial professionals and they expect that these people are properly trained and supervised,” said Huston Loke, Executive Vice President of Market Conduct, FSRA. “We encourage consumers to check credentials and we are making it easy through our new Check Credentials Tool.” Research conducted by FSRA suggests consumers may not be spending enough time seeking out a qualified financial professional and verifying their credentials. Fifty per cent of respondents spent more time researching their last cellphone purchase than they did their financial professional. In less...

CAA Survey Reveals Troubling Lack of Travel Insurance Preparedness 0

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CAA Survey Reveals Troubling Lack of Travel Insurance Preparedness

CAA launches first ever Travel Wise Week to address urgent concerns Thornhill, ON (Feb. 26, 2024) – A recent member survey conducted by CAA South Central Ontario (CAA SCO) has unveiled concerning statistics regarding the lack of travel insurance awareness and preparedness. Despite the financial risks associated with travelling unprotected, the survey found that 40 per cent of members in Ontario who travel don’t always purchase emergency medical travel insurance, highlighting a potential vulnerability. “In a world of uncertainties, our survey highlights a critical gap in travel preparedness among Ontarians,” says Kaitlynn Furse, director of corporate communications at CAA SCO. “At CAA, we believe in empowering travellers with knowledge so they can explore confidently and securely.” The survey also discovered that almost a quarter of respondents (23 per cent) ventured on their last trip outside the province without any form of travel insurance, exposing themselves to potential financial burdens in case of emergencies. Additionally, 33 per cent of people who travel with travel insurance relied on the coverage provided by their credit cards, raising concerns about coverage limitations, especially for those over 65. CAA SCO is launching its inaugural CAA Travel Wise Week In response to these findings, CAA SCO...

Got questions about critical illness insurance? 0

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Got questions about critical illness insurance?

CLHIA’s latest consumer guide has answers to help Toronto, ON (Feb. 22, 2024) – A brand new guide from the Canadian Life and Health Insurance Association (CLHIA) is helping Canadian consumers better understand the benefits of critical illness insurance, how it works, and the financial security that it offers. “Over 2 million Canadians have critical illness protection through individual or group plans,” Stephen Frank, president and CEO of CLHIA said. “This new guide explains the important role this type of insurance plays in giving people greater financial choices in the event they are diagnosed with a serious condition.” This kind of insurance pays out a non-taxable lump sum if a policyholder is diagnosed with a life-altering condition like cancer, heart attack, stroke, multiple sclerosis or Parkinson’s disease. The lump sum can be used for personal expenses related to the illness or for anything the policyholder chooses. Critical illness insurance was first sold in Canada 30 years ago and is less well known than other kinds of insurance. A Guide to Critical Illness Insurance helps to fill in the blanks with answers to questions Canadians commonly ask about the product like: How does critical illness insurance differ from life insurance or...

New savings opportunities as Canadians say they are more financially responsible today than a year ago 0

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New savings opportunities as Canadians say they are more financially responsible today than a year ago

belairdirect survey reveals 41 per cent of Canadians feel they are financially savvy and 65 per cent want to eliminate non-essential purchases Toronto, ON (Feb. 22, 2024) – Canadians are looking for savings anywhere they can find them. Seventy per cent of Canadians are looking to cut household expenses with 31 per cent saying they’ve given advice to family and friends, including finding small ways to save money, building a budget, using their cars less and finding the best deal on insurance. Canadians are looking to lower their housing (74%) and car costs (69%), and many are keeping their vehicles longer and using them less. Canadians also say they are thinking about buying a used car instead of a new car, going from a multi-car household to a single-car household, and taking public transit more often. A recent belairdirect survey shows the top five ways Canadians are cutting their spending: Cutting down on non-essentials including dining out less and waiting for sales (65%) Using coupons, discount codes, and loyalty programs (52%) Cutting down on grocery spending (41%) Cancelling unused memberships (39%) Adhering to a household budget that includes savings (32%) Seventy-three per cent of Canadians know exactly how much they spend...