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Regulatory Requirements
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2017
Regulatory Requirements  
Regulatory Requirements [Text Block]
Regulatory Requirements
Restrictions on the transfer of funds exist under regulatory requirements applicable to certain of the Company’s subsidiaries. As of December 31, 2017, the aggregate amount of unrestricted net assets was approximately $904 million.
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (“NAIC”) defines Risk-Based Capital (“RBC”) requirements for insurance companies. The RBC requirements are used by the NAIC and state insurance regulators to identify companies that merit regulatory actions designed to protect policyholders. These requirements apply to both the Company’s life and property casualty insurance companies. In addition, IDS Property Casualty is subject to the statutory surplus requirements of the State of Wisconsin. The Company’s life and property casualty companies each met their respective minimum RBC requirements.
The Company’s life and property casualty insurance companies are required to prepare statutory financial statements in accordance with the accounting practices prescribed or permitted by the insurance departments of their respective states of domicile, which vary materially from GAAP. Prescribed statutory accounting practices include publications of the NAIC, as well as state laws, regulations and general administrative rules. The more significant differences from GAAP include charging policy acquisition costs to expense as incurred, establishing annuity and insurance reserves using different actuarial methods and assumptions, valuing investments on a different basis and excluding certain assets from the balance sheet by charging them directly to surplus, such as a portion of the net deferred income tax assets.
RiverSource Life received approval from the Minnesota Department of Commerce to apply a permitted statutory accounting practice, effective July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2018, for certain derivative instruments used to economically hedge the interest rate exposure of certain variable annuity products that do not qualify for statutory hedge accounting. The permitted practice is intended to mitigate the impact to statutory surplus from the misalignment between variable annuity statutory reserves, which are not carried at fair value, and the fair value of derivatives used to economically hedge the interest rate exposure of non-life contingent living benefit guarantees. The permitted practice allows RiverSource Life to defer a portion of the change in fair value, net investment income and realized gains or losses generated from designated derivatives to the extent the amounts do not offset the current period interest-rate related change in the variable annuity statutory reserve liability. The deferred amount is amortized over ten years using the straight-line method with the ability to accelerate amortization at management’s discretion. There was no immediate impact to statutory surplus at the effective date for the permitted statutory accounting practice. As of December 31, 2017, application of this permitted practice resulted in a decrease to RiverSource Life’s statutory surplus of approximately $3 million.
State insurance statutes contain limitations as to the amount of dividends that insurers may make without providing prior notification to state regulators. For RiverSource Life, dividends in excess of unassigned surplus, as determined in accordance with accounting practices prescribed by the State of Minnesota, require advance notice to the Minnesota Department of Commerce, RiverSource Life’s primary regulator, and are subject to potential disapproval. RiverSource Life’s statutory unassigned surplus (deficit) aggregated $(306) million and $275 million as of December 31, 2017 and 2016, respectively.
In addition, dividends whose fair market value, together with that of other dividends made within the preceding 12 months, exceeds the greater of the previous year’s statutory net gain from operations or 10% of the previous year-end statutory capital and surplus are referred to as “extraordinary dividends.” Extraordinary dividends also require advance notice to the Minnesota Department of Commerce, and are subject to potential disapproval. Statutory capital and surplus for RiverSource Life was $2.4 billion and $3.0 billion as of December 31, 2017 and 2016, respectively. Statutory capital and surplus for IDS Property Casualty was $781 million and $800 million as of December 31, 2017 and 2016, respectively.
Statutory net gain from operations and net income (loss) are summarized as follows:
 
Years Ended December 31,
2017
 
2016
 
2015
(in millions)
RiverSource Life
Statutory net gain from operations
$
958

 
$
834

 
$
1,033

Statutory net income (loss)
222

 
322

 
633

IDS Property Casualty
Statutory net income (loss)
(10
)
 
(8
)
 
(44
)

Government debt securities of $4 million as of both December 31, 2017 and 2016 held by the Company’s life insurance subsidiaries were on deposit with various states as required by law.
Ameriprise Certificate Company (“ACC”) is registered as an investment company under the Investment Company Act of 1940 (the “1940 Act”). ACC markets and sells investment certificates to clients. ACC is subject to various capital requirements under the 1940 Act, laws of the State of Minnesota and understandings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) and the Minnesota Department of Commerce. The terms of the investment certificates issued by ACC and the provisions of the 1940 Act also require the maintenance by ACC of qualified assets. Under the provisions of its certificates and the 1940 Act, ACC was required to have qualified assets (as that term is defined in Section 28(b) of the 1940 Act) in the amount of $6.4 billion and $5.9 billion as of December 31, 2017 and 2016, respectively. ACC had qualified assets of $6.9 billion and $6.3 billion as of December 31, 2017 and 2016, respectively.
Ameriprise Financial and ACC entered into a Capital Support Agreement on March 2, 2009, pursuant to which Ameriprise Financial agrees to commit such capital to ACC as is necessary to satisfy applicable minimum capital requirements. Effective April 30, 2014, this agreement was amended to revise the maximum commitment to $50 million. For the years ended December 31, 2017 and 2016, ACC did not draw upon the Capital Support Agreement and had met all applicable capital requirements.
Threadneedle’s required capital is predominantly based on the requirements specified by its regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”), under its Capital Adequacy Requirements for asset managers.
The Company has five broker-dealer subsidiaries, American Enterprise Investment Services Inc., Ameriprise Financial Services, Inc., RiverSource Distributors, Inc., Columbia Management Investment Distributors, Inc. and IPI. The broker-dealers are subject to the net capital requirements of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”) and the Uniform Net Capital requirements of the SEC under Rule 15c3-1 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
Ameriprise Trust Company is subject to capital adequacy requirements under the laws of the State of Minnesota as enforced by the Minnesota Department of Commerce.
Ameriprise National Trust Bank is subject to regulation by the Comptroller of Currency (“OCC”) and, to a limited extent, by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. As a limited powers national association, Ameriprise National Trust Bank is subject to supervision under various laws and regulations enforced by the OCC, including those related to capital adequacy, liquidity and conflicts of interest.