June 2007/4

Insurance claims are continuing to rise following severe storms on its East Coast over 9-10 June. The Insurance Council of Australia said the estimated cost of claims from the storm is now A$270mn.

Giant US insurer American International Group (AIG) filed a $1bn lawsuit against its former CEO Maurice “Hank” Greenberg and ex-CFO Howard Smith last week.

The US Congress is due to discuss an extension to the federal Terrorism Risk Insurance Act (TRIA) that is scheduled to expire at the end of the year.

Lloyd’s set the terms for the public issue of £500mn of tier 1 subordinated debt last week. Following a three-day investment road show, the Corporation saw its debt issue several times oversubscribed by institutional investors.

UK run-off management company Tawa announced a round of redundancies within its 90 staff in London last week, fuelling sentiment that the discontinued business sector is heading towards greater consolidation and streamlining of its resources.

The reserving practices of Independent Insurance came under scrutiny as several of the company’s former claims staff testified in court last week.

Swiss reinsurer Glacier Re joined the list of carriers accessing the capital markets with a $75mn offering under a shelf programme providing it with retrocession cover from windstorm and earthquakes.

US insurer State Farm is set to place a giant $4bn cat programme, consisting of both bonds and loans, to provide retrocessional protection for one of its subsidiaries. The company has formed a special purpose vehicle, called Merna Re, which will provide

A flurry of (re)insurance activity in the capital markets last week ended with US giant Allstate Insurance launching a $2bn shelf catastrophe programme through a Cayman Island-based special purpose reinsurer Willow Re.

Aspen Re has become the first reinsurer to follow in the footsteps of the G6 with the launch of a live peer-to-peer electronic trading platform.

Giant Bermuda-based investment hedge fund DE Shaw Group agreed a $575mn deal for US property/casualty insurer James River Group last week.

Specialist actuarial consultants EMB has lured Duncan Anderson away from rival firm Watson Wyatt.