Current quotas limit foreign participation in Russian insurance companies to 25%.
"In the past few years, foreign insurance companies have had a stable presence on the Russian market," said Ilya Lomakin-Rumyantsev, the head of the Federal Service for Insurance Oversight, adding there were 52 insurance companies with foreign direct participation in 2002, and 53 in 2006.
He said that to the majority of large foreign companies the Russian market remains "terra incognita."
"Foreign insurers realize that investment in Russia cannot thus far justify itself," he said.
Lomakin-Rumyantsev called last year for the law on the insurance business to be amended to ease restrictions on foreign participation.
He said Russia should abolish them entirely or raise quotas to 50%.
The official said the quota, which was introduced in 1999, is ineffective because the foreign share has never come close to even half the established limit, and is easy to skirt in any event.
