Over the past five years, on average, Steel City Re’s algorithm has identified approximately five names each week that seemed expensive and potential short-sell opportunities. At the close of markets, on 30 January 2026, Steel City Re’s algorithm identified 22 names. It is an unusually high number, statistically greater than three standard deviations from the mean.
To recruit and retain robust diverse boards, companies need the protection of Steel City Re’s Side R® D&O parametric reputation insurance.
The reputation premium-seeking RepuSPX is out-performing the S&P500 Index by 408.6%. The metrics also enable parametric reputation insurance.
“In practical terms, reputation risk reflects the misalignment between what a company does and says, what various stakeholders expect and how they respond in financially relevant ways. The choices and response of those stakeholders — buying, investing, advocating, protesting, regulating, criticizing or leaving — carry consequences for a business and its operating environment, and sometimes entire industries. These are the under appreciated and tangible costs of reputation risks worth considering with more ongoing foresight”…and financial solutions like reputation insurance and board-level Side R protections.
Facebook recognized the reputational risk associated with its users’ privacy, and the shareholders homed in on this in their lawsuit. […] “Facebook is in the business of collecting user data, and if its reputation is damaged such that users lose their trust, it has the potential to damage the company’s and its investors’ long-term interest beyond the fines and penalties already paid” […] Mission-critical risks have become intertwined with boards’ fiduciary duties … reputation can be a mission-critical risk for many companies, according to Nir Kossovsky, CEO of Steel City Re, an insurance provider for reputational risk.
Reputation risk management and governance with insurance is now a best practice recommended by governance and legal authorities.
Sophisticated prospective/captive owners intent on launching a captive, or jumpstarting an expanded remit for an existing captive, may successfully overcome corporate inertia with a parametric cover for reputation risk. Reputation insurance is now a recommended best practice—Principle #9—for Reputation Risk Governance according to recently released landmark guidelines from the DCRO Institute. Reputation insurance and insurers are also recognized for their value in reducing compliance risk in America Law Institute’s March 2025 release of Principles of the Law, Compliance and Enforcement for Organizations.
The Guiding Principles from the DCRO Institute is a governance tool—for directors navigating complexity, convergence, and scrutiny. More than crisis management, these principles are a call to clarity—to governing reputation as both a mission-critical asset and a potential source of material risk. These Principles help directors avoid claims of culpability from activists, institutional investors and litigators that can create costly personal reputation losses that are not covered by D&O liability insurance.
Two recent lawsuits alleging director and officer liability have also called for board refreshment because of culpability. This emerging strategy to pressure directors to settle exposes directors to going-forward personal financial and reputation loss that is rarely covered with conventional liability insurance and is not yet widely covered with reputation insurance.
Plaintiffs suing Wells Fargo, pointing to firm’s history of reputation-damaging scandals, have asked the judge for permission to nominate three members of the bank’s board. Demands for board refreshment in shareholder lawsuits could become “a standard pressure strategy because it exposes directors to uncovered personal financial loss,” Kossovsky said, adding that such a loss would not be covered with conventional liability insurance because it is likely out of scope, “and not with parametric reputation insurance, because most boards still don’t carry it.”
Reputation Metrics Linked to Board-Level KPIs. Firms are … managing (reputation) as a measurable enterprise risk.