September 2005/1

Claims Management Group Limited (CMGL) has been acquired from Zurich Financial Services Group (Zurich) (ZFS) by a management buy-out backed by UK private equity firm Sovereign Capital Partners LLP.

LCL Group – the run-off manager to debt collections specialist – has today (5 September) announced the acquisition of Associated International Insurance (Bermuda) Limited (AIIB).

French reinsurer SCOR continued its return to profitability as it announced an 18 percent rise in net income to EUR72mn in its first half results for 2005 last Thursday (1 September).

UK insurer Brit Insurance Holdings has announced the appointment of Kathy Lisson as Chief Operating Officer as the group continues its drive for market reform and operational changes.

US broker Hilb Rogal & Hobbs Company revealed last week that it had settled with Connecticut regulators investigating the firm over alleged compensation abuses.

Supporters of UK solvent schemes of arrangement were encouraged by a Scottish Court’s decision to sanction the M&G Re scheme last Thursday (1 September).

Mark Hardinge, the former Aon Ltd managing director of its professional risks division, is set to join UK broker Heath Lambert Group later this year.

Shares decline as H1 profit slump unveiled: London-listed (re)insurer Alea Group meets with rating agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) this week in an attempt to defray a threatened downgrade following the group’s disappointing interim results last week.

Hannover Re has warned that the cost of Hurricane Katrina would mean the world’s fourth-largest reinsurer is unlikely to meet its profit forecasts for 2005.

Insured losses to the Gulf of Mexico energy sector will be twice as high as those of 2004’s Hurricane Ivan, according to the latest estimates of the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.

Amlin plc became the first Lloyd’s insurer to publicly estimate its exposures to Katrina, as it projected $110mn net of reinsurance – but shares in the group rose almost 3 percent on strong first half figures.

Devastating hurricane on course to be costliest natural catastrophe of all time: As the sheer scale of devastation wreaked by Hurricane Katrina becomes clearer, estimates of economic and insured losses have begun to escalate, as the industry starts to