Insurance companies (entry)

Categories / Economy/Finances and Credit
INSURANCE COMPANIES, financial and credit institutions, which deal with various kinds of insurance (life, real estate, personal estate insurance, etc.), the basic principle of which consists in compensating damages incurred by one person through distributing the consequences of the damage to many people. Insurance transactions were vested in the State Loan Bank. The Insurance Enterprise was created by order of Empress Catherine the Great on 28 June 1786. Emperor Pavel I ordered to establish a Board of Commodity Insurance at the State Assignation Bank on 18 December 1797. Fire damage to stone city buildings, factories, plants and goods was insured by the State Insurance Monopoly. In 1826 banker L. I. Stieglitz launched a private joint-stock insurance company and opened in 1827 the 1st Russian Fire Insurance Society (85 Moika River Embankment, since 1900 - 40 Bolshaya Morskaya Street). Its bylaws served as a model for other joint-stock insurance companies (since 1898 the society provided insurance of transport, valuable post and accidents, since 1901 – life insurance as well). In 1835 the 1st Russian Fire Insurance Society (3 Gorokhovaya Street) was opened. In 1835 life insurance was first provided in Russia – a life insurance company was opened (Nikolskaya Street, today 1 Glinki Street). In 1844 transport insurance was first provided by Russian Transport Insurance Company (27 Nevsky Prospect). In 1846 Salamander insurance company was created (6 Gorokhovaya Street), and in 1858 – the Petersburg Insurance Company (5 Nevsky Prospect), in 1867 - Russian Fire Insurance Company (7/15 Gorokhovaya Street), in 1870 - Russian Lloyd's Sea, River and Land Insurance Company (26 Angliiskaya Embankment), in 1872 - Yakor (Anchor) insurance company (8 Nevsky Prospect) and Volga insurance company (1 Kazanskaya Square), in 1875 — Nadezhda (Hope) insurance company (10 Admiralteisky Avenue; liquidated in 1908), in 1881 - Russia insurance company (37 Bolshaya Morskaya Street), in 1888 - Pomoshch (Help) insurance company (16 Malaya Morskaya Street), in 1895 - Russian Reinsurance Company (27 Bolshaya Konyushennaya Street), in 1900 - the General Company of Life Insurance and Life Income (28 Nevsky Prospect) and Rus insurance company (46 Nevsky Prospect). Branches of foreign insurance companies also functioned in St. Petersburg: New York Community Mutual Life Insurance (28 Nevsky Prospect) started its operations in 1885, Equitable life insurance company (21 Nevsky Prospect) and Urbain French life insurance company (13 Nevsky Prospect), dealing with life insurance — in 1889. In 1875 joint-stock insurance companies, in an effort to weaken competition, made an agreement and started applying common tariffs. In 1894 the Ministry of Internal Affairs established state supervision over insurance companies. Since 1905 life insurance was provided by State saving banks along with insurance companies. Boards of 14 joint-stock insurance companies functioned in St. Petersburg In 1913 (not counting the branches of 3 foreign insurance companies), 9 of them combined various kinds of private estate insurance. Also functioning in St. Petersburg were the Russian Mutual Insurance Union (65 Bolshaya Morskaya Street) and Russian Union of Mutual Fire Insurance Companies (59 Zhukovskogo Street). State supervision of insurance companies was established by the decree of the Soviet of People's Commissars of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic on 23.3.1918, and all insurance business was declared a slate monopoly by the decree of 28.11.1918 (cancelled in the early 1990s). All insurance companies were nationalised and a system of state insurance (Gosstrakh) was created instead. The St. Petersburg office of State Insurance Company (Petrogubstrakh) was opened at 30-32 Ekaterininsky Canal Embankment. In March 1931, it was replaced by the Northwestern Directorate of Russian Gosstrakh Company (46 Nevsky Prospect). In the 1940s the City Office of the USSR Gosstrakh, which had a net of regional offices, functioned in Leningrad at 1/3 Zodchego Rossi Street. Since the early 1990s private insurance companies appeared in the city, and by 2002 there were about 80 insurance companies in the city.

Reference: История торговли и промышленности в России. СПб., 1911. Т. 1, вып. 4.

A. L. Dmitrievs. Catherine II, Empress
Paul (Pavel) I, Emperor
Stieglitz Ludwig
Admiralteysky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city, house 10
Angliiskaya Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 26
Bolshaya Konyushennaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 27
Bolshaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 37
Bolshaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 40
Glinka St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 1
Gorokhovaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 7/15
Gorokhovaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 3
Gorokhovaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 6
Griboedova Canal Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 32
Griboedova Canal Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 30
Kazanskaya Square/Saint Petersburg, city, house 1
Malaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 16
Moika River Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city, house 85
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 5
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 13
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 8
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 28
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 46
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 27
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city, house 21
Zhukovskogo Street/Saint Petersburg, city, house 59
Zodchego Rossi Street/Saint Petersburg, city, house 1/3
История торговли и промышленности в России. СПб., 1911 Assignation Bank
Ministry of Internal Affairs