Mar 102022

U.S. Treasury’s Federal Insurance Office Eyes Climate Risk Factors in the Insurance Sector

Allen S. Braddock and Samuel B. Boxerman
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In February 2022, the U.S. Department of the Treasury Federal Insurance Office (FIO) announced that it would be joining the Network of Central Banks and Supervisors for Greening the Financial System. FIO intends to address climate-related financial risks and their effects on the insurance sector.

The announcement follows closely the FIO’s request for information issued on August 31, 2021. In its request for information, FIO outlined three climate-related priorities: (i) assessing climate-related issues or gaps in the supervision and regulation of insurers, (ii) assessing the potential for major disruptions of private insurance coverage in the U.S. markets that are vulnerable to climate change, and (iii) increasing FIO’s engagement on climate-related issues and leveraging the insurance sectors’ ability to achieve climate-related goals.

FIO stated that it intends to publish a climate report by the end of 2022 that focuses on the first two priorities. It remains to be seen what the report will contain or how FIO intends to achieve these priorities.

This post is as of the posting date stated above. Sidley Austin LLP assumes no duty to update this post or post about any subsequent developments having a bearing on this post.

Allen S. Braddock

abraddock@sidley.com

Samuel B. Boxerman

Washington, D.C.

sboxerman@sidley.com

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