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SuretyBind, a Competitor Owned Surety Data Platform? Mmmmm, . . . not so sure about that.

surety, surety bond, surety bonds, suretyone.com, surety one, Janus Assurance Re, C. Constantin Poindexter;

A Competitor-Owned Surety Data Platform Is a Strategic and Counterintelligence Hazard

On December 8, 2025, Chubb, The Hartford, Liberty Mutual, and Travelers announced the formation of SuretyBind, LLC, a technology company intended to provide a shared digital infrastructure to advance the surety industry (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025; Carrier Management 2025). Public materials identify two initial priorities: a data transmission platform to connect sureties, brokers, and other participants in order to reduce duplicative data entry and improve data quality (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025), and secondarily, leadership and technology to drive digital bond execution, improve verification, and reduce fraud. Services are expected in 2027 (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025). The same announcement adds a sentence that should concern any serious surety executive. It states that all SuretyBind activities are conducted under “strict antitrust supervision” (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025).

I am pondering this from the standpoint of an ex-counterintelligence operator in the U.S. I.C., so this is going to be a bit technical, but I’ll try to keep out of the woods here. In competitive industries, shared infrastructure is frequently a precondition for avoidable compromise because it concentrates sensitive operational signals, creates asymmetric incentives, and widens the attack surface. In surety, underwriting edge is built from proprietary loss experience, contractor behavior signals, i.e., known red flags to a particular surety, claims handling patterns, indemnity enforcement outcomes, and relationship intelligence. Placing any portion of the workflow on a platform co-owned by direct competitors creates structural incentives and technical pathways for abuse or worse, conspiratorial market monopolization. Even if every participant acts in good faith, the platform becomes a high-value collection point for penetration. A single breach, insider compromise, governance failure, or gradual expansion of scope can expose trade secrets and reshape market dynamics.

What the public reporting says and what it does not

The best sourced reporting largely recirculates the same core statement. PR Newswire published the launch release on December 8, 2025 (PR Newswire 2025). SuretyBind’s own press page mirrors the same language and repeats the strict antitrust supervision claim without explaining its mechanics (SuretyBind 2025). Carrier Management adds an operational detail that is material for risk analysis. A SuretyBind representative said the four sureties funded the company and will be co-owners. Carrier Management also reported that the owners will not be providing personnel to the technology company, while still participating in an advisory capacity and ultimately becoming users of the platform (Carrier Management 2025). The Insurer also reported the formation, but provides limited additional substance in the portion broadly accessible (The Insurer 2025). That thin public record is itself a risk signal. A competitor-owned platform can be built safely only with explicit and auditable commitments on data boundaries, governance controls, technical segregation, and enforceable sanctions. The public materials provide none of that detail, while asking the market to trust the platform with sensitive traffic. In other words, the interested parties’ narrative emphasizes benefits while omitting the control framework that would allow counterparties to evaluate and judge the true risk.

“Strict antitrust supervision” is not a reassuring

The phrase appears to be self-described, not a reference to a defined government oversight program. The announcement does not cite a consent decree, a published monitor, a public compliance protocol, a set of scope limitations, or enforcement triggers (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025). In ordinary United States practice, antitrust agencies do not supervise day-to-day commercial conduct of a private joint venture absent a litigation resolution, order, or decree. Where companies seek agency feedback in advance, they may pursue structured options, however, that is not equivalent to continuous supervision. Actually, continuous supervision does not transform a risky design into a safe one either.

The current antitrust environment also matters. On December 11, 2024, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice withdrew the 2000 Antitrust Guidelines for Collaborations Among Competitors, stating that the guidelines no longer provide reliable guidance and emphasizing case-by-case enforcement (FTC 2024; FTC and DOJ 2024). This shift increases uncertainty around competitor collaboration structures and heightens the need for precise internal controls rather than reliance on generic comfort language. Compliance programs must be designed for effectiveness, monitoring, and documentation. The Department of Justice Antitrust Division has also emphasized evaluation of compliance programs and their effectiveness in criminal antitrust investigations (DOJ Antitrust Division 2024).

From a counterintelligence guy’s view, antitrust is only one layer. A platform that aggregates competitor adjacent operational data flows can enable tacit coordination, whether intentional or not, by increasing market transparency around demand patterns, submission characteristics, broker behaviors, and execution timing. Even without explicit exchange of pricing (a definitive invitation for litigation or prosecution) granular operational signals can reduce uncertainty and soften competition.

The surety-specific danger is that operational data becomes underwriting intelligence

Some advocates may argue that the platform only transmits administrative data. In surety, that distinction is simply illusory. A data transmission platform that reduces duplicative entry implies common schemas, common routing, and shared pipes across sureties, brokers, and other parties (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025). Even if each surety maintains its own decisioning, several categories of intelligence can leak through metadata, workflow patterns, or integrations. Ponder these. Appetite inference. Which submissions are accepted into workflow, how fast they are processed, and what documentation is demanded can reveal risk tolerance by class, geography, contractor size, or obligee type. Surety broker and channel intelligence. Submission frequency, conversion rates, and timing reveal who controls deal flow and how competitors prioritize relationships. Loss cost signals. Even without explicit loss runs, claim-related workflow events, verification anomalies, amendment frequency, and execution delays can correlate with adverse development and portfolio stress. Process fingerprints. Digital execution embeds rules. Who requires what, when indemnity is tightened, when collateral is requested, and what exceptions are escalated are not merely operational details. They are strategic posture.

The eight-hundred-pound gorilla in the room? Over time, data quality advantages become modeling advantages. A shared system standardizes the collection of variables that eventually become features in predictive analytics. Whoever influences the schema, sees its evolution, or observes which optional fields others request learns what competitors believe matters, and can calibrate their own strategies accordingly. The risk is not only an overt breach. It is a gradual normalization of shared visibility that erodes differentiation.

Digital execution and fraud reduction goals can be achieved without competitor-owned intelligence exposure

The industry’s fraud and verification concerns are real. Industry materials, including NASBP resources, describe persistent problems of fraudulent bonds and emphasize verification as a core control (NASBP 2024). The workflow is fragmented, and obligees often verify bonds through manual steps or portal checks, which creates latency and inconsistency. Improving verification and reducing fraud is a legitimate objective that could benefit the market (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025). However, governance and ownership models are not incidental. NASBP and RiskStream Collaborative have described digitizing the surety bond ecosystem through workflow standardization and stakeholder coordination (NASBP and RiskStream 2025). That goal does not logically require a competitor-owned central platform that becomes the market’s operational nervous system. The industry can pursue interoperability standards, verification registries, and secure execution rails in ways that compartmentalize each surety’s proprietary underwriting and claims intelligence. Of course, being the surety world’s “operational nervous system” may be the entire point. I’ll leave that one and its ramifications for you to ponder, especially those carriers that will not use the platform.

A threat model for participation

If I were advising a surety carrier evaluating participation, I would treat the platform as a high-threat environment even if the stated intent is benign. The incentives are asymmetric, and the attack surface is large, . . . huge counterintelligence concerns in more than just the insurance sector. Competitor collection risk arises when competitors can shape platform features, influence schema, participate in advisory structures, or obtain privileged visibility into operational telemetry. Insider threat risk grows because platform employees and contractors can access logs, routing rules, support tickets, and integration configurations, any of which can reveal proprietary posture. Supply chain risk rises because shared infrastructure tends to accumulate dependencies, and one compromised vendor can expose all participants. Design spillover risk is persistent because once multi party rails exist, there is continuous pressure to add analytics, benchmarking, fraud scoring, and dashboards, each framed as helpful, each capable of crossing the line into competitive intelligence. Finally, regulatory and litigation discovery risk expands because centralized logs and shared repositories become new targets for subpoenas and discovery demands.

What can surety companies do to protect proprietary underwriting and claims intelligence?

Participation should be conditioned on controls that are technical, contractual, and governance-based, designed for non-trust operation. Trust is not a control. So what to do?

Data minimization must be an enforced technical requirement. Only transmit fields strictly necessary for a defined transaction. Underwriting conclusions, internal risk grades, pricing logic, claim narratives, indemnity enforcement outcomes, and loss development artifacts should be prohibited by design and validated automatically against a published data dictionary. This is the surety equivalent of compartmentation, a well-known practice in the intelligence field.

Tenant isolation and clean room architecture are imperative. If the platform evolves beyond simple message passing, there must be cryptographic and architectural isolation with separate keys, separate storage, separate processors, strict access controls, and provable segmentation. Controls should align to recognized baselines such as NIST SP 800 53 Rev 5 for access control, audit logging, and system integrity (NIST 2020).

Immutable and independently reviewable auditability must be assured. All access to production data and logs should be recorded in a tamper-evident manner and reviewable by each participant, with thresholds for alerting and independent oversight. Require third-party security assessments and continuous monitoring aligned to recognized governance frameworks such as the NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 (NIST 2024).

Governance designed to prevent competitor capture must be rigorous. A board with one seat per owner can institutionalize competitor influence rather than mitigate it. Demand an independent data governance body with veto power over schema changes, analytics features, and any cross-tenant functionality. A “one seat per JV participant” would be highly attractive to parties seeking to engage in behavior specifically prohibited by antitrust laws. Require formal change control with notice, impact analysis, and opt-out rights. Enforce purpose limitation at the governance layer so the platform cannot evolve into an intelligence lake by incremental decisions.

Antitrust compliance that is operationally real, if such a thing is even possible among the biggest players in an extreme niche sector. Given the shift to case-by-case scrutiny and the withdrawal of prior collaboration guidelines, antitrust must be treated as an ongoing operational risk, not a meaningless annual training module (FTC 2024; FTC and DOJ 2024). Implement monitored governance communications, documented escalation paths, and clear prohibitions on competitively sensitive exchanges. Use DOJ Antitrust Division compliance expectations as the reference model for program design and effectiveness testing (DOJ Antitrust Division 2024).

Contractual non-use and trade secret remedies with teeth. Simple non-disclosure will not work. Contracts should include purpose limitation, non-use clauses that prohibit competitive use, model training, and benchmarking, strong audit rights, rapid incident disclosure duties, and immediate injunctive relief triggers. Meaningful sanctions and termination rights for non-compliance must be built in. If the platform is essential to business operations, remedies that are practical and swift can serve as a deterrent.

Restrictions on personnel mixing and advisory interfaces are also important controls. The reporting that owners will not provide personnel is appropriate and should be preserved (Carrier Management 2025). Carrier participants must ban secondments of surety underwriters, claims staff, and analytics personnel into the platform operator. Advisory structures must be tightly scoped and closely monitored, as working groups can easily become informal intelligence exchanges.

All schemas and workflow rules must be viewed as highly sensitive. Even if no explicit loss data is stored, schema evolution can reveal competitive strategy. Any new data element must be justified as necessary for execution or verification and reviewed for competitive sensitivity. Red lines must include prohibition of any feature that compares participants or infers any market posture.

The structure must provide an exit capability and assume that a breach is inevitable. A robust counterintelligence posture assumes compromise will happen at some point. Rapid disengagement rights, verified data deletion and destruction, and integration architectures that allow a surety to disconnect without crippling operations are imperative. In parallel, keep internal systems compartmentalized so that a platform breach does not escalate into an enterprise breach.

My Parting Thoughts

SuretyBind’s stated objectives are understandable. Efficiency, data quality, digital execution, verification, and fraud reduction are legitimate targets (PR Newswire 2025; SuretyBind 2025). The danger lies in the ownership and incentive structure. Direct competitors are being invited to co-own the rails on which submissions, execution events, and workflow metadata will travel. Data/metadata is intelligence, workflow is strategy, and administrative is often the shadow of underwriter judgment. A single sentence about strict antitrust supervision is b.s., and NOT an adequate substitute for verifiable safeguards, particularly in an enforcement environment that emphasizes case-by-case scrutiny and has withdrawn prior competitor collaboration guidelines (FTC 2024; FTC and DOJ 2024). A counterintelligence professional does not gamble trade secrets on slogans, and neither should the participant sureties in this SuretyBind thing. If the industry truly wants digital execution, it should demand designs that keep each surety’s proprietary risk knowledge compartmented, minimize shared visibility, and make governance auditable and enforceable. Otherwise, the platform risks becoming an intelligence extraction engine that quietly redistributes underwriting advantage from those who earned it to those who can most effectively collect or acquire it. Non-participating surety companies beware. There are four very large, very influential carriers banding together for reasons that don’t appear to justify the concerning exposures inherent in the system. You should ask why.

~ C. Constantin Poindexter, MA, JD, CPCU, AFSB, ASLI, ARe

References

  • Carrier Management. 2025. “Chubb, The Hartford, Liberty and Travelers Team Up on Surety Tech Co. Launch.” December 8, 2025.
  • Federal Trade Commission. 2024. “FTC and DOJ Withdraw Guidelines for Collaboration Among Competitors.” Press release, December 11, 2024.
  • Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice. 2024. Withdrawal Statement: Guidelines for Collaboration Among Competitors. December 11, 2024.
  • National Association of Surety Bond Producers. 2024. The Importance of Surety Bond Verification.
  • National Association of Surety Bond Producers and RiskStream Collaborative. 2025. Digitizing the Surety Bond Ecosystem: Surety X Executive Summary. June 2025.
  • National Institute of Standards and Technology. 2020. Security and Privacy Controls for Information Systems and Organizations (SP 800 53 Rev. 5).
  • National Institute of Standards and Technology. 2024. The NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 (CSWP 29).
  • PR Newswire. 2025. “Leading Sureties Announce the Launch of SuretyBind.” December 8, 2025.
  • SuretyBind. 2025. “Leading Sureties Announce the Launch of SuretyBind.” Press release page, December 8, 2025.
  • U.S. Department of Justice, Antitrust Division. 2024. Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs in Criminal Antitrust Investigations. November 2024.
  • The Insurer (from Reuters). 2025. “Tech company SuretyBind formed by Chubb, The Hartford, Liberty Mutual and Travelers.” December 8, 2025.
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Defense Intelligence Agency 2025 Threat Assessment, a Brief Review

seguridad nacional, DNI, CNI, espionaje, contraespionaje, inteligencia, contrainteligencia, espia, C. Constantin Poindexter

The 2025 Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Worldwide Threat Assessment offers a reasonable thorough overview of global security challenges. There are however certain emerging threats either underrepresented or omitted entirely. I am going to offer a few of my concerns and my thoughts on the implications of the same for U.S. national security. This is not a classified assessment but rather some informed opinion and analysis grounded in open-source intelligence and expert views.

Insider Threats and Human Intelligence Vulnerabilities

The DIA report emphasizes external adversaries, It notably underplays the risks posed by insider threats. A recent incident within the very agency that has provided the 2025 report, underscores this vulnerability. Nathan Vilas Laatsch, is a 28-year-old IT specialist formerly employed by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). Laatsch was arrested on May 29, 2025, for attempting to transmit national defense information to a German government representative. He worked within the DIA’s Insider Threat Division and held a top-secret security clearance. The arrest followed an FBI investigation initiated after a tip-off in March 2025, leading to a sting operation where an undercover agent posed as a foreign official. This breach highlights counterintelligence deficiencies, internal security protocols and the challenges of detecting moles and/or other malicious insiders. Advanced behavioral analytics and machine learning models, such as deep evidential clustering are offering promise in identifying anomalous activities indicative of insider threats. Unfortunately, the integration of such technologies across intelligence community member agencies remains dangerously inconsistent. Addressing this gap requires not only technological adoption but also a cultural shift to robust and proactive internal threat detection.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Autonomous Systems as Emerging Threats

The rapid advancement of AI and autonomous systems presents both opportunities and perils. The DIA report acknowledges technological proliferation, however, it lacks a focused analysis of the misuse of AI in cyber warfare, autonomous weaponry, and information manipulation. Recent scholarly work proposes the establishment of an AI incident regime to monitor and counteract threats posed by advanced AI systems. Among recent peer-reviewed material is an excellent piece by Alejandro Ortega. “We put forward a proposal for an AI incident regime that will help to counter threats to national security posed by AI systems, . . . Our ambition is to enable a government agency to maintain comprehensive awareness of AI threats and rapidly counter any resulting risks to national security.” (Ortega, 2025) Frameworks such as that offered by Ortega aim to ensure that AI deployments do not inadvertently compromise national security, and suggest countermeasures that can effectively mitigate identified risks. Given the dual-use nature of AI technologies, there is an urgent need for comprehensive policies that address both their development and potential weaponization.

Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs) and Aerospace Security

Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs) have garnered increasing attention due to their potential implications for national security. The DIA report does not address this issue at all. A 2021 assessment by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence highlighted 144 UAP incidents, with 143 remaining unexplained. These occurrences, often near sensitive military installations, raise concerns about airspace sovereignty and surveillance vulnerabilities. The absence of a clear understanding of UAPs hampers the development of effective countermeasures. Integrating UAP analysis into broader threat assessments is essential to ensure comprehensive aerospace security. I am not suggesting that the I.C. should engage in a hunt for UFOs, as the UAPs are more likely collection mechanisms deployed by adversarial FIS, however, leaving the subject matter entirely unaddressed is questionable.

Space-Based Threats and Counterspace Capabilities

The DIA report addresses space and counter-space capabilities. It does NOT offer the breadth nor depth of analysis and informed opinion into the evolving threats in this domain that I expected. This omission is surprising, considering its direct import to the DIA’s most important customers. The Center for Strategic and International Studies’ 2025 Space Threat Assessment details the growing counter-space capabilities of nations like China and Russia, including anti-satellite weapons and electronic warfare tactics. The militarization of space poses GRAVE risks to satellite communications, navigation systems, and surveillance operations. It also endangers the antiquated GPS architecture on which global trade and national security agencies rely. Ensuring the resilience of space-based assets requires not only technological advancement but also international norms and agreements to prevent escalations in this new frontier.

The 2025 DIA Worldwide Threat Assessment provides valuable insights into current global security challenges, however, the omission or underrepresentation of insider threats, AI and autonomous systems, UAPs, and comprehensive space-based threats indicates areas requiring thorough attention. Addressing these gaps is crucial for a holistic understanding of the evolving threat landscape and for formulating effective countermeasures to safeguard national security.

~ C. Constantin Poindexter, MA in Intelligence, Graduate Certificate in Counterintelligence, JD, CISA/NCISS OSINT certification, DoD/DoS BFFOC Certification

References

Department of Justice. “U.S. Government Employee Arrested for Attempting to Provide Classified Information to Foreign Government.” U.S. Department of Justice, May 29, 2025.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/us-government-employee-arrested-attempting-provide-classified-information-foreign-government.

Nakashima, Ellen, and Devlin Barrett. “Pentagon Intelligence Employee Accused of Leaking Secrets to a Foreign Nation.” The Washington Post, May 30, 2025.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/05/30/dod-classified-document-leak/.

Tucker, Eric. “Justice Department Says Pentagon Employee Tried to Give Classified Info to Foreign Government.” Associated Press, May 30, 2025.
https://apnews.com/article/e60388df7f4e07a8d8d942d86513b27c.

Ortega, Alejandro. “A Proposal for an Incident Regime That Tracks and Counters Threats to National Security Posed by AI Systems.” arXiv preprint, March 29, 2025.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.19887.

Defense Intelligence Agency. Statement for the Record: Worldwide Threat Assessment. Submitted to the Senate Armed Services Committee, March 2025.
https://armedservices.house.gov/uploadedfiles/2025_dia_statement_for_the_record.pdf.

Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). Space Threat Assessment 2025. Washington, DC: CSIS, 2025. https://www.csis.org/analysis/space-threat-assessment-2025.

Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena. Washington, DC: ODNI, June 25, 2021. https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Preliminary-Assessment-UAP-20210625.pdf.

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Desafíos que Enfrentan las Compañías Afianzadoras: La Perspectiva de un Fiador

surety, surety bond, surety bonds, fianza, fianzas, caución, cauciones, c. constantin poindexter;

El sector de fianzas (o para los españoles “caución”), un nicho vital dentro del panorama más amplio de los servicios financieros y de seguros, se enfrenta actualmente a desafíos transformadores que amenazan los modelos tradicionales de suscripción, la rentabilidad y la sostenibilidad a largo plazo. Cinco temas dominantes emergen como las cuestiones más apremiantes: el aumento del riesgo de impago en una economía volátil, un panorama regulatorio cambiante, la presión para innovar en la suscripción a pesar de los sistemas heredados, la restricción en la disponibilidad de reaseguro, y la imperiosa necesidad de planificación del talento y sucesión en toda la industria. A continuación se presentan estos asuntos, ejemplos ilustrativos y algunas ideas sobre cómo las compañías de fianzas responder estratégicamente podrían.

Aumento del Riesgo de Incumplimiento en una Economía Volátil

La fianza de cumplimiento contractual representa una porción significativamente mayor de los ingresos por primas. El riesgo de incumplimiento por parte de contratistas ha crecido considerablemente en los últimos años debido a la volatilidad económica, las presiones inflacionarias y el acceso limitado al crédito. Los nuevos regímenes arancelarios probablemente agravarán estas presiones, aunque ese tema se abordará mejor más adelante este año. Un caso ilustrativo involucra a un contratista general de Carolina del Norte que se declaró en bancarrota bajo el Capítulo 7 durante la construcción de un instituto de enseñanza secundaria. La compañía de fianzas tuvo que intervenir, presentar un contratista sustituto y responder a más de tres millones de dólares en reclamaciones sobre la fianza de pago (Surety & Fidelity Association of America [SFAA], 2022). Este ejemplo subraya la exposición financiera cada vez mayor a la que se enfrentan las aseguradoras de fianzas en condiciones económicas deterioradas, y destaca la importancia de una suscripción rigurosa.

Panorama Regulatorio Cambiante

Las nuevas normativas y las que están por venir están reformando el perfil de riesgo y los requisitos de estructura de capital de las operaciones de fianzas. Uno de los desarrollos más significativos es la implementación de Basilea IV, un marco regulatorio global que exigirá a las instituciones financieras vinculadas al sector de fianzas incrementar sus reservas de capital. Este cambio, efectivo desde julio de 2025, puede restringir la liquidez y limitar la capacidad de las compañías de fianzas para suscribir nuevos negocios sin ajustar su apetito de riesgo (Brown & Brown, 2024). Los activos ponderados por riesgo calculados mediante modelos internos no podrán situarse por debajo del 72,5 %. Si bien esto afectará ostensiblemente a las entidades bancarias del sector, sirve de advertencia para las aseguradoras de fianzas que podrían enfrentarse a cambios en los requisitos de capital de solvencia (RBC) que los reguladores decidan implementar. En definitiva, las aseguradoras deberán ser más ágiles en la gestión de la eficiencia de capital y el riesgo de cumplimiento.

Innovación en la Suscripción frente a Sistemas Heredados

La industria está bajo una presión creciente para adoptar plataformas avanzadas de suscripción, análisis de datos e inteligencia artificial. Muchas compañías de fianzas siguen dependiendo de infraestructuras informáticas heredadas y conjuntos de datos no estructurados (especialmente históricos de siniestralidad por clase). La emisión por parte de Allianz Trade de una fianza de cumplimiento de sesenta millones de dólares para las operaciones de una multinacional en Brasil es un ejemplo claro de cómo las capacidades modernas de suscripción, las asociaciones internacionales y la agilidad legal se están convirtiendo en esenciales (Allianz Trade, 2024). Este caso muestra que las firmas con sistemas obsoletos pueden tener dificultades para competir por negocios complejos e internacionales, lo que resalta la necesidad urgente de transformación digital. Se habla mucho de la “suscripción mejorada”. El uso de herramientas avanzadas (IA), tecnologías y metodologías analíticas para mejorar la evaluación del riesgo, la solvencia crediticia y la viabilidad de proyectos es imperativo. El análisis predictivo es comúnmente identificado como (para desplegar una expresión común estadounidense) el “elefante en la habitación”, sin embargo, los modelos de aprendizaje automático y las herramientas estadísticas pueden no ser suficientes. La fianza contractual es un negocio de “relaciones”, por lo que una suscripción puramente electrónica no será una panacea.

Restricciones en el Reaseguro

Las compañías de fianzas se enfrentan a un endurecimiento de los mercados de reaseguro, particularmente para obligaciones con altas penalizaciones y especialmente en jurisdicciones con entornos litigiosos. La imposibilidad de Donald Trump de obtener una fianza de apelación de 464 millones de dólares en un caso de fraude civil, a pesar de haber solicitado cobertura a más de treinta aseguradoras (Stempel & Pierson, 2024), es un claro ejemplo. La reticencia colectiva de la industria revela, en parte, un creciente conservadurismo en el sector del reaseguro y las limitaciones prácticas a las que se enfrentan clientes que, en teoría, son altamente solventes y con buen crédito. En el sector de fianzas comprendemos bien la obligación de supersedeas y exigimos colateral en consecuencia, sin embargo, los reaseguradores se rigen por fundamentos de suscripción cedente que no siempre reflejan “lo que sabemos”. Es imperativo que las compañías de fianzas reevalúen sus relaciones contractuales y estructuras de reaseguro.

Planificación del Talento y la Sucesión

La reserva de talento de la industria de fianzas está envejeciendo. La escasez de suscriptores especializados y de liderazgo corporativo senior amenaza la capacidad a largo plazo. Un estudio reciente reveló que las pequeñas y medianas empresas encuentran dificultades para obtener fianzas debido a la falta de suscriptores con conocimientos que comprendan sus realidades operativas (Muriithi et al., 2022). A medida que los profesionales experimentados se jubilan, el sector debe invertir en programas de reclutamiento, mentoría y formación para desarrollar la próxima generación de especialistas en suscripción y gestión de siniestros. Las grandes empresas en marcha no son inmunes. La Harvard Business Review ofrece un estudio de caso sobre un proceso de sucesión exitoso (“El alto coste de una mala planificación de sucesión”), aunque fácilmente podría haber resultado desfavorable. Las observaciones de los autores merecen una consideración seria.

Conclusión

Cada uno de estos cinco desafíos —la volatilidad económica, la transformación regulatoria, el rezago digital, la presión sobre el reaseguro y la escasez de talento— representa actualmente un punto de inflexión crítico para las compañías de fianzas. Abordar estas preocupaciones requiere inversión estratégica, defensa normativa, integración tecnológica y un fuerte enfoque en el desarrollo del capital humano. Las firmas que triunfen serán aquellas capaces de mantener la disciplina en la gestión del riesgo, mientras abrazan la innovación. De lo contrario, no lograremos ni crecimiento ni rentabilidad aceptable. La clave está en enfocarse, replantear estrategias y redoblar esfuerzos en agilidad, en lo que parece ser un panorama de riesgos volátil y en rápida evolución.

~ C. Constantin Poindexter, MA, JD, CPCU, AFSB, ASLI, ARe

Referencias

Allianz Trade. (2024). Surety bond case study: Performance bond for a Brazilian project. Recuperado de https://www.allianz-trade.com/en_US/surety-bonds/surety-bonds-case-study.html

Brown & Brown. (2024). Surety Q3 2024 Market Trends. Recuperado de https://www.bbrown.com/us/insight/two-minute-takeaway-surety-q3-2024-market-trends

Muriithi, S., Louw, L., & Radloff, S. E. (2022). SMEs and the Surety Bonding Market: Exploring Underwriter Challenges. Managerial and Decision Economics, 43(3), 684–696. https://doi.org/10.1002/mde.4447

Stempel, J., & Pierson, R. (2024, 18 de marzo). Trump has failed to get appeal bond for $454 million civil fraud judgment. Reuters. Recuperado de https://www.reuters.com/legal/trump-has-failed-get-appeal-bond-454-mln-civil-fraud-judgment-lawyers-say-2024-03-18

Surety & Fidelity Association of America. (2022). Surety Case Study: North Carolina Public Project Completion. Recuperado de https://suretyinfo.org/?wpfb_dl=150

Gregory Nagel y Carrie Green, “The High Cost of Poor Succession Planning”, HBR, mayo-junio 2021, https://hbr.org/2021/05/the-high-cost-of-poor-succession-planning