May 2005/6

The head of Xchanging’s London market sector Clive Buesnel is to pioneer the rollout of the outsourcing firm in the US, The Insurance Insider can reveal.

As the fall out from New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer’s investigations into insurance industry practices continues, Swiss based Zurich Financial Services (ZFS) admitted last week that a number of its international operations had used complex...

Marsh Inc may be disposing of its wholesale units less than a year after it swooped for London based operation Prentis Donegan. Last week, following an MMC board meeting, the broking giant confirmed that it was “exploring strategic alternatives”...

Rostrum Group, the third largest investor in the Lloyd’s quoted insurance stocks, is winding up its involvement in the sector because of a failure to generate consolidation among the companies.

Embattled insurance giant American International Group moved a step closer to settling with US regulators over allegations of fraudulent business practices with the filing of a civil lawsuit against the firm and its former management duo Hank Greenberg...

After multiple delays, under-fire insurer AIG has announced today that it has finally filed its 2004 Form 10-K with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The insurance giant, which was forced to restate its accounts in the wake of the SEC...

Syndicate 33, the Lloyd’s operation managed by Hiscox, today reported unchanged forecasts for the 2003 and 2004 years account. For the 2003 year, the insurer projects a 12.5 to 17.5 percent profit on the Syndicate’s £842mn, 65 percent of which it owns.

Ambitious Lloyd’s listed insurer Chaucer Holdings said it plans to double its current underwriting capacity by the time the next sector cycle peaks, as it reported a positive start to the year in its latest trading statement, released to the London Stock

Matthew Fosh, the chief executive of Lloyd’s insurer SVB Holdings plc, described his company’s first quarter syndicate forecasts as “pleasingly uneventful” last week. The insurer – which continues to battle against a legacy of US professional indemnity

Advent Capital (Holdings) plc will float later this week on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in an IPO that will value the Lloyd’s insurer at £77mn.

As predicted in the May edition of The Insurance Insider, UK broker Heath Lambert Group has undergone another capital restructuring less than two years after a debt-for-equity swap with its bankers.

Kinnect, the Lloyd’s-backed electronic data transfer initiative, has confirmed that it is recoding its platform for future releases. Speaking to Insider Week, Iain Saville, chairman of Kinnect, said the re-coding aimed to improve the functionality...