TY - JOUR
T1 - Regulations and soundness of insurance firms: International evidence
AU - Pasiouras, Fotios
AU - Gaganis, Chrysovalantis
PY - 2012/10
Y1 - 2012/10
N2 - This paper provides the first cross-country study on the association between firms' soundness and regulatory policies in the insurance industry. Measuring solvency with an accounting based measure of distance to default, namely the Z-score, we find that the power of the supervisory authorities, and regulations related to both technical provisions and investments have an impact on soundness that is robust to controls for firm-specific and country-specific factors. In contrast, corporate governance and internal control rules do not influence soundness. Similarly, capital requirements do not appear to have a robust impact on soundness.
AB - This paper provides the first cross-country study on the association between firms' soundness and regulatory policies in the insurance industry. Measuring solvency with an accounting based measure of distance to default, namely the Z-score, we find that the power of the supervisory authorities, and regulations related to both technical provisions and investments have an impact on soundness that is robust to controls for firm-specific and country-specific factors. In contrast, corporate governance and internal control rules do not influence soundness. Similarly, capital requirements do not appear to have a robust impact on soundness.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84875117653&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2012.09.023
U2 - 10.1016/j.jbusres.2012.09.023
DO - 10.1016/j.jbusres.2012.09.023
M3 - Article
SN - 0148-2963
VL - 66
SP - 632
EP - 642
JO - Journal of Business Research
JF - Journal of Business Research
IS - 5
ER -