September 2006/2

Lloyd’s this morning announced half-year pre-tax profits of £1.35bn – marginally down on the £1.38bn booked at the same stage last year – as strong underwriting results in benign conditions were offset by a fall in investment income.

Reinsurers who fail to meet the challenge of cycle management risk being downgraded, said rating agency Fitch as it released its report on the sector at the beginning of September.

Consolidation of arbitration takes new path

Insurance giant Zurich Financial Services (ZFS) reported half-year net profits of $1.96bn, up 9 percent on the first six months of 2005, and ahead of analysts’ consensus of $1.8bn.

UK professional indemnity (PI) rates are under pressure and nowhere is this more keenly felt than solicitors’ PI.

Lloyd’s insurers saw half-year profits dented by the impact of foreign exchange adjustments, with the effect on the bottom line partially influenced by the hedging strategy company's employed.

Bookmakers will rarely accept bets once the race has started which explains why – halfway through the Atlantic hurricane season – there have not been any recent US windstorm catastrophe (cat) bonds.

Analysts offered a muted response to SCOR’s interim results despite a 42 percent rise in net profits at the French (re)insurer, sending the share price of the company down 6 percent.

It was a tale of two markets for reinsurance specialist Benfield Group with disappointing news on its new corporate risks division being more than matched by impressive earnings growth in its US division on the back of the capacity crunch for catastrophe

Two months after Jardine Lloyd Thompson’s (JLT) proposed takeover of rival Heath Lambert fell through, analysts have turned their attention to the quoted UK broker’s prospects as an independent entity.

Sidecar vehicles have now raised more than $4bn in capital since they roared into fashion in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina last year.

The going rate for a privately owned broker is typically one to one-and-a-half times annual broking revenues, which suggests US broker Lockton Company and the private equity firm Stone Point Capital LLC bought Alexander Forbes’ international arm...