Structuring Captive Insurance Programs: Key Provisions, Regulatory Requirements, Risk-Pooling Arrangements

Description

Captive insurance programs have been in use for more than 50 years. From Fortune 500 companies to sophisticated family-owned ventures, captive insurance offers the flexibility to manage an organization's unique risks while also providing value to the company's bottom line. The structure can take the form of a single parent, group/association, or segregated protected cells, among many others.

When structured as a subsidiary, ownership of the captive is held by the operating company. Structuring as an affiliate, on the other hand, places ownership with the person(s) who own the parent organization. In either case, the captive is a separate entity and its form should be led by the business' strategic needs and goals of ownership.

At its fundamental level, a captive insurance program uses funds set aside from a general treasury to provide coverage of uninsured losses as incurred. Unlike typical self-insurance schemes, however, captive programs are "smarter" in that they can afford their owners a number of tax and non-tax benefits like the availability of tailored coverage and capturing underwriting income. Practitioners seeking to leverage the potential tax benefits, however, must carefully structure the program to achieve the requisite risk-shifting and risk distribution attributes shared by traditional insurance companies.

Listen as our distinguished panel discusses the most effective uses for captive insurance programs, best practices for leveraging their benefits for businesses of all sizes, and key provisions to include when structuring the entity.