Insurance Commissioner Dennis Funa
MANILA – Insurance Commissioner Dennis Funa is confident that insurance companies will not go bankrupt as a result of the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic.
“Insurers are well-capitalized. I don’t think that is the immediate issue,” he said in a statement Wednesday.
Funa said the enhanced community quarantine’s (ECQ) initial impact will be on the insurance companies’ investments and sales of their products.
“That is why I allowed them to resort to online selling. In terms of investments, we all know that all industries will take a hit,” he added.
Under Republic Act (RA) 10607, otherwise known as the Insurance Code, new players are required to have a PHP1-billion paid-up capital.
For existing insurance companies, they are required to have a minimum net worth of PHP250 million by June 30, 2013; PHP550 million by Dec. 31, 2016; PHP900 million by Dec. 31, 2019; and PHP1.3 billion by Dec. 31, 2022.
Insurance Commission (IC) Media Relations Officer lawyer Joanne Frances D.C. Castro told journalists in a Viber message they did a survey among insurers regarding Covid-19 coverage and related claims “in order for us to make an initial impact assessment of the Covid-19 pandemic.”
“No update on the results yet because the deadline for this was yesterday (April 29),” she said, adding they will make public the results of the survey once it is available. (PNA)
