November 2006/5

Reinsurance broker Guy Carpenter is leading a consortium of brokers, including Aon Corp and Jardine Lloyd Thompson, which will place Brazil’s largest property contract in the January renewals.

Industry legend Hank Greenberg and his Starr companies have sold over 27 million shares in his former company, American International Group (AIG), since May.

AIM-listed Heritage Underwriting Agency plc announced on 24 November that it has raised £14.6mn in a share placement.

Resurgent French (re)insurer SCOR has been upgraded back to "A" territory again, this time by Fitch Ratings on 20 November, a day ahead of the closure of its acquisition of life reinsurer Revios.

US insurer The Hartford Financial Services Group has issued a $247.5mn cat bond, Foundation II, to protect the company in the event of certain US natural catastrophe losses.

Perhaps demonstrating the capital market’s restraint over supporting new reinsurance ventures, a trio of start-ups in the sector that were mooted to list on the London Stock Exchange’s Alternative Investment Market (AIM) look increasingly unlikely to proc

XL Capital, which announced the first of the post-Katrina sidecars Cyrus Re in November last year, has launched a new Cayman Islands special purpose reinsurance vehicle, Stoneheath Re.

The nine shareholder members that are departing Oil Insurance Ltd at the end of the year will face a collective bill of $200mn for leaving the energy mutual.

Lloyd’s insurer Kiln plc increased the forecasts on the bulk of its syndicates when it updated the 2004-5 years in a trading statement on 24 November.

Omega Underwriting Holdings plc’s move to Bermuda was endorsed by Numis Securities analyst Nick Johnson last week (22 November).

The Lloyd’s Corporation has brought in David Harris - a senior representative of the G6 group of London market insurers – on secondment, as the three-hundred-year-old Society agrees a number of changes to improve the service it provides.

Run-off services provider CMGL has announced the appointment of Robert Bisson as general manager of its French operations.