The International Court of Arbitration ruled in favor of the health insurance company UNION, a health insurance subsidiary of the Dutch insurer ACHMEA, following its legal action started against Slovakia. The insurer claimed the violation of the investments protection agreements when PM Robert Fico, during his first mandate, decided to ban private insurers from making profits. The Court decided that the Slovak Republic will have to pay ACHMEA about EUR 22 million in compensation for the loss of profit and another EUR 3 million in arbitration costs.

In ruling over the case, the International Court of Arbitration took into consideration a 2011 decision of the Slovak Constitutional Court, which decided that Fico's legislation prohibiting profits was unconstitutional.

With a portfolio of 400,000 clients, UNION is one of the two private insurers which are currently pushed by the government to leave the Slovak specialty market, with the aim of placing the entire health insurance business under the umbrella of the state-run General Health Insurance Company, already controlling the health insurance issues for 3.6 million citizens (~66% of the total number of insured citizens). According to PM Fico's statement, the government will pick early next year an adviser to assess the value of the two private insurers operating in Slovakia and will negotiate with the buy-out terms during the entire year 2013. Yet, if they will fail to reach a reasonable agreement by the end of the year, the two companies will be, most probably, expropriated.

Under the current circumstances created by the ruling of the International Court of Arbitration, it seems the nationalization operation has fewer chances to succeed, although the government's representatives announced that Slovakia will contest the ruling and take the case to the European Court of Justice. The Government's reaction is based on a precedent set by the previous decision of the arbitration court with regard to the similar case filed by DOVERA, the second private health insurer subjected to the same governmental haze. On that occasion the Court decided it has no jurisdiction for presiding over the case.