Fleming hires Khare to lead casualty ILS solutions push

Fleming Insurance Holdings, a property and casualty prospective and retrospective capital solutions provider, has hired former Point72 executive Samir Khare as Head of Casualty ILS Solutions, as the firm looks to the capital markets to securitize insurance risk.

Fleming Insurance Holdings, which counts Fleming Re as part of its stable and is sponsored by private equity firm Fleming Corp, with a majority investment stake from Altamont Capital Partners, specialises in solutions for small and mid-sized P&C carriers across the US, Bermuda, and Europe / UK.

The company has been exploring the insurance-linked securities (ILS) space as part of its mission to develop a secondary market for P&C insurance liabilities, including through the securitization of insurance risk and its transfer to capital market investors.

Samir Khare joined the company recently to lead Fleming’s casualty ILS solutions push, bringing roughly two decades of financial market experience.

This push into the casualty ILS market will see Fleming building out its risk pooling and structuring capabilities to transform casualty insurance risk to the capital markets.

Khare was most recently an analyst at hedge fund Point72 for just over two years, prior to which he spent almost a decade as an analyst focused on insurance sector investing at Capital Returns Management.

He has also held positions at PwC as an actuarial consultant, as well as investment firms Quanta US Holdings and Sanford Bernstein.

“Samir’s unique background and experience is perfectly suited to make our ILS initiative a huge success,” CEO Eric Haller explained.

Fleming said that the risks underpinning its push into casualty ILS will initially focus on low volatility legacy reserves on a retrospective basis, from its existing and growing legacy portfolio, as well as similar business lines on a prospective basis as part of their capital market solutions offering.

The company said that its Planned Loss Portfolio Transfer (LPT) product will be used alongside casualty ILS structures to shorten the liability tail.

The same solution will also be utilised in the Fleming legacy segment with ceding insurers, to free up balance sheet capacity on a recurring basis.

Altamont Capital Partners took a majority stake and made a $150 million growth capital commitment to Fleming Holdings earlier this year, with the stated goal to grow Fleming into “an all-encompassing capital solutions provider to property and casualty (P&C) insurance companies.”

Another stated goal was to establish Fleming in the insurance-linked investment solutions space as well.

Finding ways to connect P&C insurance liabilities, including casualty risks, with capital market investors using ILS market infrastructure is an expanding area of activity, with Fleming just the latest trying to open up what is seen as a potentially significant new market segment.

Writing both run-off and prospective risks, from MGA’s, captives and other insurers, Fleming Re clearly sees an opportunity to leverage investor appetite for insurance risks to provide efficient capital solutions to clients, while delivering returns to capital partners.