OREANDA-NEWS. On November 07, 2008 the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) held a session of the Expert Council for Protection of Competition on the Market of Financial Services and the Working Group for devising the draft Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation "On Conditions of Allowability of the Agreements between Credit and Insurance Organizations". The session discussed the draft Decree revised with the account of critical comments made at the prevision session of the Council, reported the press-centre of FAS.

FAS Russia has devised the draft Decree to exercise the powers of the Government of the Russian Federation, specified in the Federal Law "On Protection of Competition", to determine the cases when agreements, that restrict or can restrict competition, are allowed. The need to produce such a document arises from aggressive collaboration of credit and insurance organizations in insuring borrowers' risks as well as significant number of antimonopoly violations discovered by the antimonopoly bodies investigating agreements between banks and insurers.

The session of the Expert Council was attended by representatives of the State Duma, the Federation Council, the Executive Office of the President of the Russian Federation, federal executive bodies, the Central Bank of Russia and the antimonopoly authority as well as representatives of financial, insurance, rating, academic and other organizations and independent experts.

Summing up the discussion, members of the Expert Council endorsed in general the draft Decree. FAS Russia will forward the document to the Government of the Russian Federation in the near future.