A former top American insurance regulator has publicly backed Bermuda’s regulatory regime, saying Bermuda, the United States and European watchdogs are increasingly aligned on transparency as the island’s life reinsurance sector keeps expanding.

Speaking at the first Association of Bermuda Insurers and Reinsurers Risk Forum this week, Andrew Mais, a self-described “recovering regulator” and former president of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, told an audience of reinsurers and regulators at the Hamilton Princess & Beach Club on Wednesday that Bermuda’s rapid growth had come with tougher oversight from the Bermuda Monetary Authority and closer coordination with its counterparts.

Mr Mais said that as Bermuda’s life and annuity market had taken on a growing share of US risk, “the BMA increased scrutiny, including prior approvals for certain long-term block transactions, expanded disclosures, liquidity and anti-money-laundering focus, and they addressed the concerns about illiquidity, complexity, conflicts and governance”.

As of last year, Bermuda reinsurers held over $900 billion in American life and annuity liabilities, more than 80 per cent of the offshore total.

His comments come amid heightened international focus on Bermuda’s asset-intensive life reinsurance model, particularly where reinsurers are owned fully or in part by private-equity firms. In recent years the International Monetary Fund has warned of potential contagion from offshore reinsurance, while NAIC has made the investment practices of life reinsurers a priority.

Local industry leaders have argued that Bermuda has responded to the challenge. In an interview last week, Suzanne Williams, chief executive of Bermuda International Long-Term Insurers and Reinsurers, said BMA reforms like the introduction of a prudent person principle, enhanced public disclosures and a 2008-style crisis stress test had bolstered the jurisdiction’s credibility.

Mr Mais’s remarks from the American side of the table appeared to agree.

Looking across major watchdogs, he said he saw “alignment among regulators”, adding that “the BMA, the NAIC, they each articulated their priorities for this year with notable alignment around transparency, accountability and the collaboration to address those protection gaps”. He also pointed to their mutual “support for responsible and principles-based innovation”.

Bermuda’s status, he said, is underpinned by its rare combination of Solvency II equivalence in Europe and reciprocal jurisdiction status with the US. That dual recognition builds on a life reinsurance sector that now oversees more than $1.5 trillion in assets, services 90 million policyholders globally and, according to BMA data, maintains capital well above regulatory minimums even under severe stress scenarios.

Mr Mais framed all of this as ultimately about trust rather than box-ticking. Insurance and reinsurance, he said, are “a business of trust”, and “properly regulated capital will be the foundation for growth going forward”.