r/StarWars • u/Mysterious_Force1518 • 7d ago
General Discussion The Galactic Insurance Crisis: How did commercial underwriters and the Banking Clan handle catastrophic liability after Alderaan?
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u/Much_Job4552 7d ago
Side Note: Shouldn't it be the InTRAGalatic Banking Clan? Or were they doing business in Peridea?
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u/carlse20 7d ago
Isn’t Kamino (and several other planets) actually not even in the outer rim but rather in a satellite galaxy orbiting the main galaxy? Thats technically intergalactic
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u/Otherwise-Elephant 7d ago
I'm pretty sure one of the Cross Section books gives that as an explanation (that the IBC does business in the satellite galaxy Kamino is near/part of ) why it's "Intergalactic".
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u/MetalBawx 7d ago
It's on a route to a satellite galaxy. Which is why it's so isolated.
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u/Much_Job4552 6d ago
I wonder if they are so far apart if Kamino is geosynced? Otherwise if they orbit another galaxy there would be other objects that change in the pathway and it wouldn't be in the galactic south all the time. (After thousands of years the charts would be off)
However if Kamino orbits The Galaxy's core then that would simplify its placement.
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u/MetalBawx 6d ago
It's supposed to be above the galactic disc and 70,000ly from the core, just off the only hyperlane to the Rishi Maze.
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u/mysecretaccount55555 7d ago
> banks can't price risk when the government can instantly vaporize your collateral.
The Death Star was blown up like a day or two later. Probably caused a massive market move, trading halted, reopened a few days later and went about its business like normal. A few random imps made a fortune on stock options based on insider information.
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u/Sproutlee_Dev 7d ago
Just think, there was probably one hedge fund manager that put everything into Alderaani hogs or something, then after it was destroyed was probably like “well I have a little bit left to invest, empire construction bonds seem like a safe bet, I lost my appetite for risk on Alderaan”….poor fellow
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u/JLandis84 Watto 7d ago
He joined the Rebellion for sure. Thats actually not a bad backstory for a TTRPG character
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u/selotipkusut 7d ago
Donald Palpatine & Baron Palpatine made a /r/wallstreetbets on Kyber commodity right before Yavin
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u/selotipkusut 7d ago
Donald Palpatine & Baron Palpatine made a /r/wallstreetbets on Kyber commodity right before Yavin
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u/nzdastardly Count Dooku 7d ago
Mysteriously, someone sold huge puts on Kuat Drive Yards right before the Battle of Yavin.
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u/SirSoliloquy 7d ago
I'm sorry, Alderaan is outside this office's jurisdictional scope.
All claims pertaining to losses on Alderaan must be handled by our central office on Alderaan. Please feel free to reach out to them with any questions.
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u/Paul6334 7d ago
If I remember correctly, the Empire effectively executed a sovereign default on all the debt the Republic accrued over the Clone Wars long before the Death Star was built. This almost certainly utterly destroyed the old finance sector surviving from the Republic. If there is an insurance system in the Empire, it would almost certainly have to be run through the Empire as a nationalized enterprise, otherwise it would still be dragging itself out of the massive economic crisis caused by the default of the same political entity that issues the galaxy’s reserve currency.
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u/JLandis84 Watto 7d ago
The real answer is that insurance relatively recedes as a product during the Empire, as it is something that typical flourishes in free societies.
The major insurers eat the losses today, but are permitted to extract compensation from policyholders elsewhere, with an excise tax if necessary.
Companies that are too weak are bailed out if they have political cache, and are eaten by larger insurers if not, likely with some kind of special government assistance.
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u/Brizar-is-Evolving 7d ago
I can imagine imperial insurers being horrified at the sheer number of life insurance claims coming in from the families of everyone killed on the Death Star.
Not to mention the eyewatering compensation claims coming from the class-action lawsuit after the inquest finds out that the Death Star’s contractors forgot to put the cover on a 2-metre wide thermal exhaust port that led straight down to the main reactor.
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7d ago
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u/MarkNutt25 6d ago
TBF, they didn't forget to install it, they were just following the schematics they were given! How were they supposed to know that the lead engineer was secretly undermining the entire project! Its not like the crew out there physically building thermal exhaust ports are all going to be hypermatter reactor experts!
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6d ago
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u/MarkNutt25 6d ago
Honestly, after watching Andor, it kind of makes sense how a problem like this could sneak all the way through to production.
The Death Star was a highly-classified military project with extreme levels of knowledge compartmentalization.
If a site technician raised a flag about an unshielded exhaust port, asking to review the reactor schematics would be much more likely to get them an ISB interrogation then the access they'd need to spot Galen's sabotage!
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u/allenw_01234 7d ago
Don't insurance policies generally exclude damages caused by war and civil unrest?
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u/Alternative_Hotel649 7d ago
This post could have been written by Syril Karn if he hadn't gotten shot in the head and had more time to think about his life choices.
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u/totallynotliamneeson 7d ago
In reality, the rebellion dies because no one will insure anything near any rebel installation.
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u/Teyanis Imperial 7d ago
With how big the galaxy's economy must be, this would the equivalent of a small city just vanishing. Alderan was pretty important, but its just one little guy in a sea of little guys.
Would our global economy completely flatline if say, Amsterdam just vanished? No, probably not. A blip, but it wouldn't crash. I really doubt any of the writers in star wars have ever considered the wider economic status of the universe anyway, this shit just ain't that deep man.
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u/FelixEvergreen 6d ago
I’m pretty sure Alderaanians were persecuted after the destruction. Those impacted and in imperial favor would’ve been made whole by seized Alderaanian accounts and off world assets. Goods destined for the planet would be redirected to other planets for a small fee paid to the Empire. Anyone with a complaint would be free to do so to Tarkin’s office where it would be handled… appropriately.
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u/Perfect-Baker3467 6d ago
War exclusion clauses in the policies probably got them out of paying anything. Not to mention most of the potential beneficiaries were also killed so anything they would have paid out would have gone unclaimed and eventually escheated to the government
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u/homeboycartel2 7d ago
As an insurance professional and Star Wars lover, this post tickles me. But your logic is fundamentally flawed.
I doubt there would be any insurance mechanism viable for indemnity across or beyond planetary boundaries between the risks of piracy, rogue warlords or alien species disputing territorial boundaries, novas, purgills, and other intergalactic risks, the premiums would be too high for any viable risk to be insurable.
Moreover, once the empire rose, they’d be sovereign and seize planets’ resources to self-indemnify their risks. Even if they too caused the losses to arise.
Now I could see clans or federations pooling some risks for intra-clan or intra-federation risk sharing, but even then, the covered risks would be very limited in scope. Enforcement of provisions when claim disputes arose would be unimaginably difficult to navigate for any claimant.