Irish Central Bank fines subsidiary of France’s AXA over breaches

DUBLIN (Reuters) – The Irish Central Bank has fined a subsidiary of French insurer AXA 3.6 million euros ($3.8 million) for failures in corporate governance and risk management and the handling of conflicts of interest, it said on Friday.

The bank said subsidiary AXA Life Europe DAC “did not put in place an effective process to identify, manage, monitor and report the risks” arising from approximately 30,000 policies issued in Germany under the TwinStar brand.

It also found the subsidiary failed to establish effective conflict of interest policies and procedures and that it failed to conduct an adequate assessment of potential conflicts of interest in 2018.

The subsidiary has admitted the three breaches, the central bank said in a statement. AXA did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

An initial fine of 5.2 million was reduced by 30% under an early settlement discount scheme, said the bank, which supervises the insurance sector.

($1 = 0.9473 euros)

(Writing by Conor Humphries; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)