Policyholder Pulse

What Policyholders Should Know About Their Insurance When a "New" Long-Tail Risk Emerges: A Practical Checklist

2025年10月10日 11:57:20 +0000

Companies in certain industries have years and even decades of experience in defending and resolving "long-tail" liabilities for suits, claims and other proceedings—such as for asbestos-related disease or environmental-related third-party property damage—that involve bodily injuries or property damage spanning multiple years arising out of their historical operations. Insureds who have faced such claims also have […]

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The 2025 Pillsbury Insurance Policyholder Summit

2025年10月07日 22:41:14 +0000

The annual Pillsbury Insurance Policyholder Summit is once again approaching!

Taking place on October 28, this signature event will occur simultaneously in our New York, Houston and San Francisco offices, with live collaboration between locations.

The Summit brings together industry leaders and risk management professionals to explore today’s most pressing insurance challenges and opportunities. This year’s program will highlight emerging risks and evolving issues, including AI risk developments, trends in environmental liability and transactional risk insurance, construction coverage for data centers and infrastructure, and managing complex/mass tort claims.

For more information or to register, please contact Tricia Larade .

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The Hidden Risks of "Per-Occurrence" Self-Insured Retentions in CGL Coverage

2025年9月03日 18:57:17 +0000

[画像:GettyImages-96502246-e1756925799704-300x268]General and products liability policies are a cornerstone of risk management for businesses, providing protection against alleged liability because of bodily injury, property damage, and personal or advertising injury claims. These policies are often paired with self-insured retentions (SIRs). Although some policies with SIRs may provide "first dollar" coverage, particularly for defense costs, an SIR typically represents the amount of covered loss a company agrees to pay out of pocket before the primary layer insurer’s coverage attaches. While common, SIRs can introduce many traps for the unwary—especially if the SIR is applied on a "per-occurrence" basis (or, in some policies, a "per-claim" basis) without an aggregate cap.

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California Appeals Court Reinforces that Insurer Failure to Investigate Potential Bases for Coverage Outside the Pleadings Can Constitute Bad Faith

2025年8月25日 17:29:29 +0000

In the recently published case Bartel v. Chicago Title Insurance Company, a California appellate court reaffirmed longstanding California law on insurers’ broad duty to defend even in the face of complicated underlying facts, finding that failure to investigate all potential avenues for coverage amounted to bad faith as a matter of law. A Brief and […]

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Paloma Resources v. Axis Insurance Shows How "The" Can Be the Genuine Article in a Policyholder Defense

2025年8月18日 17:01:30 +0000

[画像:ant-barbells-483576367-300x225]It’s said that an ant can carry fifty times its own weight. That’s nothing.

A recent decision out of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit provides a compelling reminder to policyholders and their counsel: Even the smallest word in an insurance policy—and even the placement of a punctuation mark—can carry tremendous weight. In fact, it can alter the meaning of an entire insurance policy. In Paloma Resources, L.L.C. v. Axis Insurance Co., the court vacated summary judgment in favor of the insurer based on the placement of a single word—"the"—in an exclusion clause.

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Navigating Insurance Coverage for Customs and FCA Risks in a Shifting Trade Landscape

2025年8月07日 14:12:10 +0000

In a recent post, we briefly explored potential insurance coverage for tariff- and trade-related losses, particularly in the context of escalating global trade tensions and U.S. enforcement trends. Since then, enforcement activity under the False Claims Act (FCA) continues to intensify, particularly around customs compliance. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) are closely examining how goods are classified, valued and routed. These developments present complex compliance challenges and potential exposure for companies across industries, including importers, logistics providers and government contractors.

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Strength in Numbers—The Class Actions Strategy for Insurance Claims

2025年7月30日 18:08:39 +0000

[画像:class-action-1354168975-300x185]When wildfires, floods or other disasters strike, multiple policyholders can be affected in similar ways. But historically, each policyholder would take on their insurance company alone—a tough task, especially for individual policyholders and especially when any given policyholder’s claim is dwarfed by the relative legal and financial might of the insurer. The recent ruling in Pitkin v. State Farm, however, shows how class actions can level the playing field.

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When Politics Disrupt the Flow: What Policyholders Need to Know About Supply Chain and Political Risk Coverage

2025年6月23日 17:43:20 +0000

In today’s volatile global economy, companies are learning the hard way that political shocks—whether through trade sanctions, military conflict or abrupt regulatory change—can wreak havoc on supply chains. And worse, many are discovering that their existing insurance coverage may not offer relief. From soaring oil prices due to Middle East tensions to re-energized trade wars […]

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The Beginning of the End of an Era? Competition to Delaware’s Supremacy as Corporate Domicile and Implications for D&O Insurance

2025年6月09日 19:51:31 +0000

[画像:Moving-1388396620-300x225]Delaware has long been the leading jurisdiction in which companies incorporate. According to Delaware’s published statistics from 2023 :

Delaware surpassed two million total business entities domiciled in the state,
67.6% of all Fortune 500 companies were incorporated in Delaware, and
80% of IPOs in the U.S. were in Delaware

Because of Delaware’s long-held title as the premiere state of incorporation, it has developed an advanced mosaic of corporate statutes and precedential law consisting of protections for both corporate officers and directors as well as shareholders. Some of the most well-known features of Delaware corporate law are:

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Untying the Gordian Knot: The Second Circuit (Re)joins the Fray of Reverse Preemption of International Arbitration Provisions in Insurance Policies

2025年5月28日 17:43:45 +0000

[画像:knot-668093380-300x200]The Second Circuit Court of Appeals has weighed in (again) on a still unsettled issue in the realm of insurance law: whether arbitration provisions in insurance policies issued by foreign insurers are enforceable notwithstanding states’ anti-arbitration statutes? If they are, coverage disputes between policyholders and insurers are likely to be relegated to arbitral decision under insurer-favored arbitration clauses; if not, policyholders may pursue their rights in a more favorable forum. In Certain Underwriters at Lloyds, London v. 3131 Veterans Blvd LLC, the Second Circuit abrogated its previous decision in Stephens v. American International Insurance and answered this question in the affirmative, finding such provisions enforceable under the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (also known as the "New York Convention").

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