A Study On Legal System Of China’s Bank Insurance Agent

With the continuous development of financial globalization and integration,crossfusion and mixed operation in the financial field obviously has become global trends. Inthis context the integration of banking and insurance emerges,and Bancassurancebecomes an important area of banking and insurance cooperation.As China is adivided-business-operation country,the cooperation of banking and insurance is stillconfined to the agent.Though time is not long,the insurance agent business has achievedastonishing development speed.According to the special topic research of China Banking Regulatory Commissionand China Insurance Regulatory Commission,the insurance agent business ofcommercial banks has occupied half of national insurance.Channels and continue to maintain high growth momentum,and at the same time，there has occurred a series of problems and risks,it’s necessary for us to provokethinking about the regulatory legal norms and how to deepen bancassurancecooperation.Compared with China,advanced countries have been quite mature in thebancassurance cooperation.It’s important to guide our bancassurance transformationdevelopment by learning their successful experience in combination with our ownnational conditions.This paper is divided into four parts,making quite in-depth discussions about thebasic theory of bancassuarance,the development of foreign bancassuarance,the legalsystem of China’s bank insurance agent,etc.Chapter One is Basic Theories of Bancassurance.This chapter presents thedefinition of bancassurance and its business modes,and as well give an analysis aboutthe current situations and existing problems of China’s bank insurance agent.There arevarious definitions of bancassurance in theory and practice,such as Channels orienteddefinition,Integration oriented definition,Financial Management0riented definition,etc.Currently bancassuarance is to choose banking channels to sell insurance products inmost countries,while it varies in business modes,such as Distribution Agreementsmode,Strategic Alliance mode,Joint Venture mode,Financial Group mode,etc.AndChina adopts the Band Insurance Agent mode,the initial development phase ofbancassuarance,which is unsatisfactory no matter in the cooperation depth or breadth.Chapter Two is Empirical Foreign Bancassurance.This chapter aims to learn useful experience from advanced countries in regulatory legal system,foreign bancassurancecharacteristics and foreign bancassurance evaluation in general,advanced countriesadopt relax attitudes to bancassurance,and drive it all in the direction of Financial Groupmode,and the laws and regulations are perfect,the regulatory cooperation is effective aswell.While China imposes severe restrictions on it,and considering the dividedoperation unchangeable in short term and regulatory policies at this stage,it’s necessaryfor China’s bancassurance to transform from the simple Bank Agency mode to FinancialHolding Company mode.Above choice is possible if only the businesses of parentcompany and subsidiary are isolated strictly.Chapter Three is China’s Legal Systems of Bank Insurance Agent The main partposition of china’s bank insurance agent undergoes a fairly long process of evolution.With the deepening of the financial systems reform,China encourages wider and deepercooperation of banking and insurance,and the regulatory laws and systems are graduallystandardized,making explicit requirements for the insurance agent qualifications ofcommercial banks,the qualifications of salesman,the internal controls of insuranceagent,agency commissions,product distributions,Co-competitions and so on.Nevertheless,such problems still remains unsolved as inducting,misleading and cheatingthe consumers in insurance agent activities.And these are closely related with China’sincomplete legal systems,inadequate laws and regulations,strict regulations andsupervision systems.Chapter Four is Regulatory Legal Systems of China’s Bank Insurance Agent fortheir social public monopolistic and infectious character,it’s necessary for thegovernment to supervise the financial institutions engaged in bank insurance business.Given the present laws and regulations of the insurance agent are incomplete,the levelsand efficiency are low as well,here is a need to set out a “Bank Insurance AgentBusiness Management Regulations”,to reinforce the supervisions of premiumfees,unfair competition,insurance product promotion,etc.Now most products of bankinsurance agent are simple life insurance ones,and the product homogeneity is quiteserious among various insurance companies.It is necessary to make product systems ofbank insurance agent,and the regulatory department can control the risks,and it’s alsoneeded to encourage banks and insurance companies to create more products of bankinsurance agent suited to China’s national conditions and consumers.Financial Holding Company mode represents the development trends of China’sbancassurance,and as a matter of fact,a range of financial holding companies have occurred in China,such as China Citic Bank,China Everbright Bank.For now or thefuture,it’s a must to make “Financial Holding Company Act” to guide and standardizethe existing companies,meanwhile hasten the birth of new financial holding companies.For designing the Financial Holding Company Systems,we can give considerationsin these aspects:The first is to make a clear definition of the Financial Holding Company.The waydefining the Financial Holding Company will exert an effect on the development ofbancassurance,and considering the integration restrictions of China’s banking andinsurance capitals,the Financial Holding Company is defined as “A company wholly ormainly engaged in two or more different financial businesses,among which arebanking,insurance,securities,and so on,and controlling more than one financial companyby holding a certain percentage of shares or other means”.The second is to establish the Financial Holding Company mode,and inconsideration of China’s realities,it’s more realistic to choose purely Financial HoldingCompany mode.The third is to make firewall systems and information disclosure systems for theFinancial Holding Company.The fourth is to set up Financial Supervisory Commission in charge of Overallcoordination and cross-sectoral regulatory of China’s financial industry.