The (re)insurance industry is waking up to the prospect that losses from Superstorm Sandy are likely to be significantly higher than first anticipated for a modelled Category 1 hurricane striking the north-east US.
In the hours just before and after the storm made landfall in New Jersey, the consensus among cat modellers, carriers and brokers was of an industry loss at a magnitude that would be largely retained by primary insurers.
But only days later, the sheer scale of destruction and widespread disruption to infrastructure is setting Sandy on course to be the second costliest US wind event for insurers and their reinsurers behind Hurricane Katrina.
It is also beginning to change the "mood music" about the forthcoming property cat reinsurance renewals, with industry figures beginning to acknowledge that the scale of the losses could indeed impact negotiations and possibly absorb some of the downward rating pressures that have been building this year.
To view the The Insurance Insider's special report on Sandy please click here.