January 2004/4

Willis revealed today (12 January) that it has agreed to buy Danish reinsurance broker Kirecon A/S, headquartered in Copenhagen.

Kiln plc revealed last week that it is the first Lloyd’s insurer to offer Long-term and Domestic War on Land insurance, a new class of cover which combines both multi-year international war insurance with domestic war on land.

The New Year’s Day gas plant fire in South Australia could cost the industry around $400mn, according to early estimates.

Bermudian giant XL Capital announced last Tuesday (6 January) that it has ploughed $100mn additional capital into its financial guaranty arm to fund business growth.

French and US regulators have released details of a compliance programme for French bank Credit Lyonnais, which reached settlement earlier this month in a long running investigation into alleged breaches of American and California state banking laws in th

Wellington Underwriting plc brought in the New Year with an upbeat analysts’ presentation last week as the insurer rounded off a busy 2003 and unveiled a 15 percent cross-cycle after tax ROE (return on equity) target.

Amlin - Lloyd’s second largest insurer by capacity - heralded a successful renewals season and a bullish outlook as it released a trading statement last Friday (9 January ‘04).

Berkshire Hathaway’s late decision to significantly reduce capacity on its subsidiary Lloyd’s insurer Marlborough helped keep Lloyd’s 2004 capacity below the headline £15bn capacity.

Lloyd’s liability start-up Illium Syndicate 4040 announced today (12 January) the appointment of four new underwriters. The appointees are Paul Baynham, Paul Woodward, Colin Ivory and Matt Hunt.

Shelbourne Development, a privately owned Irish property group, is close to buying the iconic Lloyd’s of London building, One Lime Street.

The world’s fifth largest broker Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group (JLT) last Thursday (8 January) announced management changes at its reinsurance arm JLT Risk Solutions.

Controversial Lloyd’s based MGA Risk UK has lost its senior underwriter Hugh Rivington less than a year after it was accused of conspiracy to defraud by its former backer, German reinsurer R+V Versicherung.