Top Insurance Attorney Joins Arent Fox

One of the sharpest insurance attorneys in New York is now a Partner at Arent Fox, an emerging insurance powerhouse. Huhnsik Chung, has joined the firm’s Complex Litigation and Insurance & Reinsurance groups bringing more than three decades of experience advising clients nationally and internationally in the highly regulated financial and insurance sectors. To disclose, Huhnsik is a good friend and fellow director of IFNY but this is a serious announcement not a bouquet.

Huhnsik represents clients in a wide range of regulatory and transactional matters, while also resolving complex disputes that arise in the insurance industry. He advises on insurance-related matters involving formations and capitalizations, mergers and acquisitions, portfolio transfers, insurance-linked securities, investments, commutation agreements, and restructurings and receiverships. Huhnsik also advises on risk mitigation and exposures arising from transactions and investments, global licensing issues, tax matters, and representations and warranties policies on both the buy and sell side. In his dispute resolution practice, Huhnsik has served as lead counsel in more than 70 insurance, reinsurance, and commercial proceedings.

His clients include insurers, reinsurers, captives, insurance intermediaries, insurance technology companies, risk purchasing groups, risk retention groups, and investors. Huhnsik has deep experience in the energy sector representing oil/gas and utilities industry mutuals and captives. He also focuses on the blockchain and digital asset development space, where he represents accelerators, exchanges, sponsors, investors, developers and banks, primarily in Asia and Bermuda.

There’s more. Keep your eye on this top gun in the insurance legal world.

Time to Freeze Spending Sprees

As if the Federal Budget Bill at $ 1.7 trillion passed Christmas week were not enough of a debt to hand to our children and theirs on a federal level, New York’s part-time senators and assemblymembers gave themselves a 29 percent pay increase that makes them the highest paid state Legislature. Happy New Year, New Yorkers.

Something of exemplary in the annals of one party rule, the legislation (A10730/S9617) increases members’ pay to $142,000 starting in January. Besides their salary, New York state lawmakers have state healthcare, dental and vision coverage, retiree health coverage, and state retirement benefits. They also receive reimbursements for their travel to Albany and per-diem payments to cover lodging and meals in Albany. Their pay was last increased at the start of 2019, when lawmakers raised their base salary from $79,500 to $110,000 using an unelected commission. Subsequent raises ordered by the pay commission, which would have hiked the salary to $130,000 by 2021 if the Legislature passed on-time budgets in 2019 and 2020 were struck down in court. California will have the second-highest pay at $122,694. New Jersey will pay its lawmakers $49,000 next year, while Connecticut lawmakers will get about $45,000 in salary and stipends.

The legislation filed last night limits the outside income lawmakers can collect to $35,000, linking the cap to the pay state and local government retirees may receive while also collecting a state pension.

The impact on re-election efforts is now more than a public service aspiration, not exactly what our forbearers envisioned.

We now have a professional legislative body – not good for public policy..  SA