Markel CATCo listed retro fund adds new director

Markel CATCo Investment Management has added a new director to its stock exchange listed and in run-off retrocessional reinsurance focused investment strategy, the CATCo Reinsurance Opportunities Fund Ltd.

The Board of the retro reinsurance fund announced that they have appointed Arthur Jones as a non-executive Director effective yesterday. Jones will also join and become Chair of the listed ILS funds Audit Committee.

The move comes as former Board director Alastair Barbour retires. This had been announced back in February 2019 and he now retires from the CATCo Reinsurance Opportunities Fund Board with immediate effect.

Jones is a Bermuda resident and a Chartered Accountant with 35 years’ experience working across the financial services sector. He has no holdings in the Markel CATCo managed listed retrocessional reinsurance investment fund.

He currently holds the position of Chief Financial Officer of the Consolidated Group of Companies, a firm that provides corporate and accounting services to clients, with a specialism working with the insurance and investment fund industries.

Jones has been with the Consolidated Group of Companies since 1987. Between 2005 and 2018, he served on the Boards of Directors of a number of Bermuda-incorporated hedge and long-only equity funds that were under the management of the Martin Currie Group.

James Keyes, Chairman of the CATCo Reinsurance Opportunities Fund, said, “The Board is pleased to confirm Arthur’s appointment while expressing our appreciation for Alastair’s contribution to the Board and Audit Committee on which he has served over the last eight years. His insight, knowledge and experience have been invaluable. We wish Alastair well for the future.”

Given the process to return capital to investors in the Markel CATCo fund could take some time to complete, it is essential to have a strong Board and committees in place throughout this process.

The fund has been making regular share buybacks over the last few weeks, as it starts to acquire holdings and as the portfolio can be run-off it will make steps to do so. This will in time allow it to unwind its loss affected positions and fully realise the losses that so impacted its reinsurance portfolio over the last few years.

This now includes impacts from recent catastrophe events including typhoon Hagibis, which has impacted the funds 2019 underwriting portfolio, giving it now three years worth of positions facing some level of deterioration as they run-off.