Reinsurance News

The reinsurance cycle will continue, but future peaks and troughs will increasingly be shaped by capital market appetite for insurance risk, thinks Lixin Zeng, chief executive of AlphaCat Managers Ltd.

As the reinsurance industry begins its discussions on the prospects for January 2019 renewals buyers are pushing for rate reductions in lines of business that have been performing, but a fully soft market is not a foregone conclusion.

One of the big surprises in the reinsurance sector following the level of catastrophe losses in 2017 was the reloading and expansion of alternative, or third-party reinsurance capital, according to the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of SCOR, Denis Kessler.

As Hurricane Florence bears down on the US East Coast as a category 4 storm, Luca Albertini, CEO and founding partner of Leadenhall Capital Partners warned that regardless of whether it is a market-changing loss, it could trap collateral in retro programmes.

The insurance-linked securities (ILS) market has become “an established force” in the natural catastrophe underwriting markets, but Christian Mumenthaler, the CEO of reinsurance firm Swiss Re, questions whether ILS markets are operating in sustainable territory.

Fermat Capital Management’s John Seo explains to Artemis why the “great reload” of 2018 sounded the final death knell of the traditional reinsurance cycle.

Brian Duperreault, the CEO of insurance giant AIG, discussed the state of his company, the progress he is making in his mission to turn it around and the market forces seen today, in a speech in Monte Carlo yesterday.

Insurance and reinsurance firms should not take it for granted that capital will flow into the industry in the aftermath of another major loss, thinks Frank Majors, co-founder and principal of Nephila Capital.

The market should expect more mergers and acquisitions (M&) activity surrounding ILS funds or entities as re/insurers look to harness the capital markets, while at the same time efforts to bring the capital markets further along the value-chain are seen as “intelligent”, according to Aon executives.

At this time of year, as peak-conference season begins, the market tends to reflect on conditions and the drivers setting up dynamics for year-end and beyond.