insurance

Pioneer Underwriters, the specialist underwriting services organisation that looks to match its risks with various sources of capital, has agreed terms for a strategic transaction that will see it combine with specialty insurance services holding company, K2 Insurance Services LLC.

Losses from the severe hailstorms that struck southeastern Australia in January continue to rise, with the latest insurance industry loss estimate now 24% higher at A$638 million.

Reinsurance pricing could rise by as much as 20% at the Florida renewals in June 2020, with the continued pressure from loss creep on both insurers and reinsurers the main driver, according to A.M. Best.

Constrained levels of insurance-linked securities (ILS) capital remains a feature of the market as it moves into 2020, in some cases affecting the ability of cedents to secure the coverage they needed at the recent renewals.

Global insurance and reinsurance group Everest Re has pre-announced an expectation of a $215 million catastrophe loss hit and a further $50 million hit from its crop reinsurance book in the fourth-quarter of 2019.

The Australian bushfire disaster has caused some capital to be trapped within the listed retrocessional reinsurance investment fund strategy operated by Markel CATCo, while continued loss creep from hurricane Irma also hit exposed positions at the end of 2019.

Bermuda headquartered specialty insurance and reinsurance group Aspen Insurance Holdings Limited has announced the hiring of Andrew Kudera as Executive Vice President and the firms new Group Chief Actuary.

Australian primary insurance giant Suncorp has referred to an “unprecedented” start to the season for catastrophe losses this morning, saying that it now expects to make recoveries across its reinsurance program, including its main program, drop-downs and aggregate reinsurance including perhaps its stop-loss.

A powerful magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck the Caribbean yesterday in the afternoon local time, swaying buildings as far away as Miami, Florida and causing some localised damage to countries including the Cayman Islands, Jamaica and Cuba.

Global life, longevity and morbidity reinsurance firm Pacific Life Re has completed the second largest UK longevity swap transaction on record, taking on UK £10 billion of longevity risk from Lloyd’s Banking Group pension funds.