November 2005/1

In our regular monthly London News Digest, we round up key stories from the last month, presenting them to you in easily digestable snippets.

It was a mixed bag as the big three global brokers announced their third-quarter results. Although Aon’s net income was unchanged from 2004 at $122mn it was below analysts forecasts.

The pace of growth at medium-sized brokerages on both sides of the Atlantic last year far outstripped that of the industry’s big names. And the trend is likely to accelerate in 2005, with the “Spitzer Effect” expected to play an increasing role.

Cat specialists get roughest ride as 3Q losses mount... The pain inflicted by hurricanes Katrina and Rita is clearly reflected in the third quarter reporting of Bermuda’s (re)insurers, a period set to go down in history as the costliest ever quarter...

In our regular monthly International News Digest, we round up key stories from the last month, presenting them to you in easily digestable snippets.

Existing reinsurers are creating innovative “side-car” companies with hedge fund capital eager for exposure to the reinsurance sector. At a time when rating agencies are scrutinising companies’ exposures to property catastrophe and retrocessional...

Following Katrina, the received wisdom was that there would be few, if any, Bermudian start-ups. But as the magnitude of the three storm losses begins to sink in (AXIS’s John Charman raised the prospect of up to $80bn of losses in 2005 which, if you...