PRA to comply with most guidelines for Solvency II

The European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) has updated its webpages on its guidelines on preparing for Solvency II to include the responses of competent authorities in EEA Member States, in accordance with the "comply or explain" procedure applying to EIOPA guidelines. 

The updated webpages provide details of each Member States’ response on the following guidelines:

• Forward looking assessment of own risks;
• Systems of governance;
• Pre application of internal models; and
• Submission of information to national competent authorities.

The Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA) has:

• confirmed compliance except in cases where finalisation of the technical specifications is pending: “However, in line with our overall support for the guidelines and our consideration of the specific outcomes intended here, the PRA expects to ‘comply’ once the awaited technical specifications are published but reserves its final position.”; and
• stated, in respect of guideline 30 in the systems of governance for securitised instruments, that it will not comply because the “guideline is difficult to interpret, in particular because although it is drafted at a high level of generality it includes concepts and terminology used in other EU legislation incorporating very detailed and specific requirements.  In addition, EIOPA has drafted some explanatory material in relation to the Guideline which arguably extends beyond the two specific provisions of Solvency II referred to.  As currently drafted, the Guideline is therefore considered to be too legally uncertain for the PRA to set clear expectations and some firms have raised this concern in their feedback to the consultation on our Supervisory Statement.”

 Related links:

https://eiopa.europa.eu/publications/eiopa-guidelines-new/guidelines-on-forward-looking-assessment-of-own-risks-based-on-the-orsa-principles/index.html

https://eiopa.europa.eu/publications/eiopa-guidelines-new/guidelines-on-system-of-governance/index.html

https://eiopa.europa.eu/publications/eiopa-guidelines-new/guidelines-on-pre-application-of-internal-models/index.html

https://eiopa.europa.eu/publications/eiopa-guidelines-new/guidelines-on-submission-of-information-to-national-competent-authorities/index.html