Following up on the announcement of the deregulation of the bancassurance sales limits at the recent Insurance Reform Meeting (as discussed in our previous newsletter (Link), on April 16, 2025, the Financial Services Commission (“FSC”) formally announced the implementation of the innovative financial services program to ease the current limits on the sale of insurance products though bancassurance.

The existing regulations had limited the sales of any single insurer’s products to 25% of the total annual sales of a financial institution insurance agency. Such limits meant that a consumer may not have been able to purchase specific desired products, by causing agencies to refrain from selling such products or to more actively promote the sale of other products. To address this issue and ensure broader consumer choices, the FSC has introduced new limits, expanding the current limits on single insurer products to (i) 33% for life insurance products (for banks, the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation (“Nonghyup”), Korean Federation of Livestock Cooperative (“Chukhyup”), and financial investment firms) and (ii) 50% (for banks and Nonghyup/Chukhyup) and 75% (for financial investment firms) for non-life insurance products.

Moreover, Storm and Flood Insurance policies are to be excluded from the calculation of sales limits, in order to promote the sales of such insurance products as a matter of public policy.

The financial supervisory authorities have indicated that the results of the innovative financial services program will be reviewed and assessed at the end of 2025, and the sales limits applicable for 2026, will be determined based on such results.

[Korean Version]