March 2005/5

Lloyd’s pre-1993 run-off vehicle Equitas announced today (29 March) that it has reached a comprehensive agreement to settle its largest direct asbestos exposure by paying $415mn into a settlement trust account.

French reinsurer SCOR looks to have put the difficulties of 2003 behind it as it reported a return to profitability last week (24 March) and earned an upgrade from Fitch Ratings – despite record natural catastrophe losses in 2004 and a fourth quarter rese

But strong property casualty performance as reinsurer looks to hard 2005

American International Group chairman Hank Greenberg will formally part company with the insurance giant this week – only two weeks after agreeing to step down as the company chief executive.

Senior Marsh executives Peter F. Garvey and William A. Malloy are not the closest of friends – indeed their relationship is such that eyebrows were raised among Marsh insiders when they were promoted, amidst the maelstrom unleashed by Spitzer last year, t

Bermudian giant ACE is looking to increase its activity in the emerging markets of Eastern Europe, with the news last Thursday (24 March) that it has received regulatory approval to begin underwriting commercial property casualty business out of its Polis

Lloyd’s listed specialist underwriter Hardy Underwriting Group plc announced lower profits last Thursday (24 March) in line with its profits warning earlier in the month (Insider Week No 163), as windstorm losses and a potentially material financial insti

The drive towards digitalising claims in the London market received fresh impetus last Wednesday (23 March) with the news that four brokers and nine managing agents have signed up to use the new electronic claims infrastructure by mid-2006.

The long awaited conclusions of the European Commission’s (EC) probe into alleged anti-competitive practices employed by aviation insurers in the aftermath of 9/11 were revealed last week along with a series of binding reforms to “promote competition and

HCC Insurance Holdings was praised today (29 March) by Raymond James & Associates Inc’s insurance analyst Greg Peters for both its operational performance and levels of transparency.

BP’s strategy of self-insurance will ensure that the liabilities arising from the deadly explosion at its Texan oil refinery last week remain largely with the oil giant.

More than 1,000 people are thought to have perished in the massive earthquake which struck a small island off western Indonesia yesterday – a mere 100 miles from the epicentre of the Boxing Day earthquake that left 280,000 people dead or missing across As