CIMA pulls the plug on Clico Cayman

| 06/03/2009

(CNS): UPDATED 7 March 11:00 am – The Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA) has issued a “cease and desist order” to insurance company CLICO. CIMA said on Friday that it had “issued a Public Notice outlining actions taken with regard to Colonial Life Insurance Company (Trinidad) Limited, trading as Clico (Cayman) Ltd.” The Authority said it issued the order on Tuesday, 3 March, in accordance with to section 12 of the Insurance Law (2008 Revision).  In response CLICO stated that the directive  relates only to its investment policies.

Under the Order, CIMA has directed the company to, “immediately (i) cease or refrain from issuing new policies with investment features until the asset level in its trust fund has been increased to the required level and approval is granted by the Authority for the Company to resume such activity; and (ii) cease or refrain from receiving any new premiums on existing policies with investment features until approval is granted by the Authority to resume such activity.”

CIMA has also required Clico to “take certain actions within a prescribed time frame and imposed additional reporting requirements on the Company to better monitor its business activities and financial condition.

In its own statement CLICO [Cayman] said that in discussion with CIMA in late February, the company advised the Authority that no new investment policies were being underwritten since the end of January.

"CLICO continues to communicate with CIMA and assures policyholders that it is fully available for client support," the company said. It also stated that it wished to assure policyholders and the public that the company continues to service all its existing policies.

On January 30, 2009, the government of Trinidad and Tobago and the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago announced that the T&T government had reached an agreement with the CL  Financial group (the parent company of CLICO) for the provision of a package of financial support for the group’s financial services companies. As a result of the above action CLICO is now under the control of the Central Bank and  Andrew C. Musaib-Ali has been appointed as managing director. Musaib-Ali reports directly to the Central Bank of T&T.
 

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  1. Anonymous says:
    07/03/2009 at 5:18 am

    Dear Editor…

    How does this affect those with Health Insurance Policies with Clico Cayman?

    CNS: We’ll update the article when more is known.

    • Anonymous says:
      07/03/2009 at 7:32 pm

      The CIMA action appears to only relate to "polices with investment features". These are usually life insurance type policies not home, health, etc. However, it would be good to know more to allay fears. I would hope that CLICO would be very forthcoming with information otherwise they stand to dig themselves into a deeper hole.

      • Anonymous says:
        11/03/2009 at 12:06 pm

        I think CLICO has already dug their "hole" if you look at the actions now being taken by insurance regulators in Trinidad, Barbados, Belize, Guyana etc. 

        CLICO’s problem is that they have not been "forthcoming" with information for many years, whilst Lawrence Duprey has managed to fund an extremely wealthy lifestyle, including multi-million dollar mansions in Florida.  If I had even just a bicycle insured with CLICO right now I would think very seriously about insuring it somewhere else (and NOT with British American Insurance, which is a CLICO sister company).

        One of the few benefits of international economic crunches is that they tend to expose weasels like Duprey, Michael Misick (TCI) and Allen Stanford (Antigua).

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