April 2008/4

Insurance Australia Group (IAG) said it will not accept a merger with QBE Insurance, despite downgrading its full-year profit outlook.

The hard-pressed airline market showed signs of recovery at the 1 April renewals with rates rising by as much as 10 percent on some major airline accounts, according to underwriting sources.

(Re)insurance broker Willis Group Holdings has announced the launch of a new tool which will allow clients to rate and compare carriers on standards such as claims settling and policy administration.

Trading platform Insurance Futures Exchange Services (IFEX) has seen increased interest from Lloyd's managing agents in trading insurance linked derivatives.

Guy Carpenter & Co's newly formed M&A advisory team is understood to be leaving the reinsurance intermediary, following news of the firm's major restructuring first reported by The Insurance Insider earlier this month.

New York State insurance superintendent Eric Dinallo is in talks with XL Capital’s troubled affiliate Security Capital Assurance Ltd (SCA) over its capital raising plans.

Former Brit Insurance CEO of global markets Mike Sibthorpe is to join rival US-based WR Berkley, The Insurance Insider can reveal.

Controlling a third of any market place gets regulators uneasy, especially in a sector as unpopular among consumers as insurance.

Bermudian (re)insurer XL Capital Ltd reported a 49 percent drop in net income for the first quarter 2008 on the prior-year period, to $276.9mn or $1.57 per ordinary share.

Cooper Gay, the London-headquartered broker currently in talks to buy Heath Lambert's wholesale operations, is mulling the possibility of an initial public offering (IPO) as early as this year, according to reports.

The start-up reinsurance intermediary Alpha Re has landed a $9mn property catastrophe account from larger rival Guy Carpenter & Co.

As an estimated 10,000 delegates converge on San Diego for 2008's Risk and Insurance Management Society's (RIMS) conference, fresh evidence has emerged of how brokers' revenue models are being transformed amid pressure from buyers and regulators.