Reinsurance renewals news

RenaissanceRe, the Bermuda-based reinsurance firm and third-party capital management specialist, saw strong inflows from investors in time for the January renewal season, as its Capital Partners unit raised $453 million from external investors.

US primary insurance firm Travelers has expanded its core per-occurrence catastrophe cover at the reinsurance renewals in January 2022, but shrunk its aggregate cover and renewed it at tighter terms, reflecting market conditions and loss activity.

Neil Eckert, Chairman of Conduit Re, a reinsurance company that started-up just over a year ago, believes that there could be some shortages in catastrophe capacity as 2022 progresses, which may provide attractive opportunities.

The value-proposition of risk transfer through reinsurance remains strong, according to broking giant Aon, who said recently that while reinsurance capital levels remain adequate across most of the market, there are some opportunities for new capital to enter and existing players to expand.

Reinsurance market pricing is expected to keep rising through 2022 at the renewals, but the rate of increase is expected to slow somewhat, by Fitch Ratings.

Conduit Re, a Class of 2021 reinsurance start-up that raised close to $1.1 billion of capital for its launch in an IPO, said this morning that it has secured its own outwards reinsurance (retrocession) at the January renewals, noting that it expects to make more retro purchases as the year progresses.

Reinsurance as a sector and the major global reinsurers have suffered due to elevated catastrophe losses in recent years, but analysts at investment bank Berenberg believe that Hannover Re’s comprehensive retrocession program is giving investors confidence and helped to buoy its share price in 2021.

The market for retrocessional reinsurance has been one of the most capital constrained and loss impacted over the last few months, which has resulted in an adjustment to priorities for those writing retro covers, while buyers are having to adapt to the demands of capital.

Reinsurance rates and pricing have more ground to cover at the important June and July renewal seasons in 2022, as analysts and our sources all agree there is further catching up to do.

Kingstone Companies, Inc., a multi-line property and casualty insurance company focused on New York and surrounding northeast areas of the US, has added back a quota share reinsurance arrangement to cover its personal lines business for 2022.