Barnert Associates, Inc. was founded in 1986 to provide insurance regulatory consulting services centering on the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), state insurance departments, and state legislatures.
Today, BAI advises its many clients on a variety of asset and investment related insurance regulation issues – from upcoming recommendations for investment valuation, reporting, accounting, and reserving requirements – to new model laws, regulations, and accounting guidance.
An Informed, Coordinated Response
But knowing how NAIC and state rules and regulations may affect you or your clients is only half the battle. Addressing and positively influencing potential action with a fully integrated and coordinated strategy - involving media, industry groups, legislators and regulators - is the other half.
BAI can do both for you.
We keep up with the action, no matter where it is, saving you countless staff hours and costly travel so that our clients can concentrate on their core business concerns.
A History of Service Excellence
BAI has been staying ahead of the curve on behalf of its clients for nearly a quarter of a century. Our clients are among the top life and property / casualty insurance company investment officers; investment and asset management specialists; legal, compliance, accounting, actuarial, and government affairs professionals; trade association executives; insurance investment service providers; and investment bank officers. A representative list of our clients is available through the link below.
You can rely on BAI to actively participate in and analyze NAIC deliberations and make recommendations with immediacy, precision, and detailed accuracy.
Meet Doug Barnert
Doug Barnert is President of Barnert Associates, Inc. formed in 1986, and of Barnert Global Ltd. formed in August of 1999. Both companies provide national and international consulting services. He is also Publisher of The Barnert ReportsTM, a monthly commentary on investment and other asset related issues in insurance regulation. (www.barnert.com)
Barnert is deeply involved in efforts to coordinate international accounting standards. Barnert is the executive director of the Group of North American Insurance Enterprises, (www.gnaie.net) a group of Chief Financial Officers committed to influencing the development of international accounting standards.
The firm also coordinates the activities of the Global Communications Group, a group of nine insurance company trade associations from around the world that share ideas and strategy on a regular basis.
In order to accomplish this Barnert and his staff have attended every IASC/IASB Board meeting around the world since the meetings were opened March 1999.
Barnert is an Official Observer to the International Association of Insurance Supervisors. For two years he coordinated presentations of international observers to the Accounting Subcommittee of the IAIS. He reports regularly to the Emerging Countries Subcommittee of the IAIS on accounting developments in the world.
Currently Barnert works with interested industry advisors to assist the National Association of Insurance Commissioners in responding to proposals by the International Accounting Standards Board and the Financial Accounting Standards Board.
In addition to Mr. Barnert’s participation in the development of international insurance standards, he also advises insurers and others on a variety of assets and investment related insurance regulation issues such as upcoming recommendations for investment valuation, reporting, accounting, and reserving requirements.
For example, Mr. Barnert is participating in a project by the NAIC to potentially reopen the Investment of Insurers Model Act. The effort will allow Barnert to draw on years of previous experience when the first model was developed and he worked with interested parties in drafting industry position papers and rationale for the NAIC Investment of Insurers Model Act – Defined Limits Version or the Pigeonhole Model Investment Law – with specialization in the sections on mutual funds, real estate and mortgages, and government sponsored enterprises. When that was completed, he coordinated the industry efforts to obtain adoption by the NAIC of an alternative model using the Wisconsin format of a more prudent approach to investments.
Barnert’s experience was also drawn upon in 2000 when he was asked by the Georgia Insurance Department, the Georgia Legislature, and the Georgia Insurance Industry to coordinate the drafting, presentation, and resolution of issues on the rewriting of the state’s thirty-year-old insurance investment law. It resulted in the enactment of H.B. 43, a balance between prudence and definitions that preserved much of the historical patterns of Georgia regulation.
Barnert serves on the Board of Electric Insurance Company and is the Chairman of its Audit Committee.
The foundation for these accomplishments was built on many years of previous experience including his work as a consultant to the Investment Committee of the National Alliance of Life Companies (NALC). As part of that work he represented insurers who were not able to attend the multiple meetings and conference calls each month on asset valuation, invested asset, risk based capital, securitization, actuarial opinions, and life insurance products.
Prior to forming all three companies Barnert served as Chairman of the New York Chamber of Commerce Workers Compensation Committee and was active on the Committees of Health, Insurance, Workers Compensation, Financial Services and Construction of the Business Council of New York State. Mr. Barnert was Chairman of the Business Council Task Force of Long Term Care and served on the Task Force on Hospital Reimbursement.
Earlier in his career Mr. Barnert was Vice President-Eastern Region of the Alliance of American Insurers, a trade association of more than 175 property and liability insurance companies.
Before joining the Alliance Mr. Barnert was Assistant Deputy Commissioner for the Texas State Board of Insurance where he created the Legislative, Research and Compliance sections of the agency that, among other things, supervised the reorganization of the insurance department.