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Reinsurance

“Pandemics,climate change,cyber top the current risk chart”:Munich Re

The coronavirus pandemic needs to be a lesson to us all: We must take action more rapidly and vigorously to ensure that we are not as unprepared as we were with COVID-19 for risks such as cyber attacks or climate change. It is possible to better safeguard against the financial consequences of such risks for the benefit of humanity. It needs to be clear that systemic risks like pandemics also require systemic countermeasures – for instance, the creation of state-backed risk pools to make uninsurable risks bearable,said Torsten Jeworrek,Member of the Board of Munich Re.

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Total expected onshore U.S. insured losses from Hurricane Laura around $9bn – $13bn:RMS

RMS estimates an additional US$1.0bn to US$2.0 billion of insured losses to offshore platforms, rigs, and pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico, due to wind and wave-driven damages. Offshore losses were estimated using the September 2020 vintage of the RMS Offshore Platform Industry Exposure Database

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Swiss Re retains top spot in AM Best’s top 50 ranking of global reinsurers

The top 10 accounted for 69% of the top 50’s total GPW. In recent years, this percentage has consistently been around 70%, which reinforces AM Best’s sentiment that the industry’s largest reinsurers continue to house disproportionately sizable amounts of risk, despite cedants’ efforts to diversify their reinsurance panels and spread out their counterparty risk.
The top 50 reinsurance groups reported an average combined ratio of 102.4 in 2019, a modest deterioration from the 2018 combined ratio of 100.9. Losses were driven primarily by social inflation in U.S. casualty business and typhoons in Asia, as well as loss creep from 2018 storms.
India’s GIC Re,with a gross premium of $6.86 billion,is the12th largest company(11th in 2018 list) in the AM Best list of top 50 global reinsurers

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Insurers must do more to support COVID-19-related mental health issues:GlobalData

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that 12.8 million UK working days were lost in 2019 because of work-related stress, anxiety and depression. While the HSE has continued to raise the issue of remote-working staff’s mental health during the pandemic, insurers are penalizing policyholders for flagging any related issues. Consumer campaign group Fairer Finance has found that insurers such as Budget, Virgin Money, Beagle Street and Canada Life are actually increasing the cost of premiums for consumers that declare minor stress issues.

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Blaze breaks out again on supertanker off Sri Lanka, cargo area intact

The New Diamond, a very large crude carrier (VLCC) chartered by Indian Oil Corp (IOC), was fully loaded with the equivalent of about 2 million barrels of oil, Refinitiv data showed.

Photographs taken by Sri Lanka’s air force showed extensive damage to the tanker’s funnel, and thick black smoke and flames coming from the bridge, that sits just behind the cargo area.

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Global reinsurers maintain equilibrium through COVID-19 turbulence:AM Best

The global reinsurance composite has produced a five-year (2015-2019) average combined ratio of 99.6% and a return on equity of 5.7%. The report notes, however, that 3-4 percentage points of that combined ratio performance is attributable to favorable loss reserve development. This benefit continues to diminish, and without prompt, corrective action, will create a drag on earnings.

Companies’ individual abilities to take advantage of the hardening market conditions are likely to be influenced by a flight to quality. After three years of significant industry losses, those companies with a solid financial strength, robust reputation and market position, as well as stable, consistent and transparent results, should be best-positioned to optimize their underwriting risk portfolio and continue to attract and deploy capital. In the medium term,

Swiss Re Ltd. retained the top spot as the world’s largest reinsurer, as measured by reinsurance gross premium written, in AM Best’s highly regarded annual ranking of the Top 50 Global Reinsurance Groups. Munich Reinsurance Company again was No. 2 in this latest ranking as the top 10 remained largely stable from last year. 

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Climate change to drive large future Cat losses

It’s a mess at least partially of our own making, said Susan Cutter, director of the Hazards and Vulnerability Institute at the University of South Carolina.

“We are seeing an increase of intensity of these phenomena because we as a society are fundamentally changing the Earth and at the same time we are moving to locations that are more hazardous,” Cutter said Wednesday.

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