Capital markets

Price-to-book (P/B) valuations for P&C (re)insurers are typically better now than they were a year ago, despite the recent drift in (re)insurers' share prices and negative investor sentiment regarding future earnings prospects.

London-based insurance-linked securities (ILS) fund manager Securis Investment Partners has hired Martin Reith to take on the newly created role of advisory director.

Pricing guidance has tightened on the Texas Windstorm Insurance Association (Twia)'s Alamo Re cat bond, the first post-June transaction on the insurance-linked securities market, sister publication Trading Risk reported last week.

Erik Manning has resigned from Guy Carpenter, where he had spent four years placing retro business in Bermuda, and is expected to join Markel shortly in a new capital markets role, sister publication Trading Risk reports.

Tokio Millennium Re (TMR) is holding talks with alternative capital providers in a bid to secure capacity commitments that would allow it to significantly increase its line size on select reinsurance placements, The Insurance Insider can reveal.

Multinational fund manager Blackstone has sold down its cat bond holdings within the $1.18bn Blackstone Alternative Multi-Strategy Fund as it reduced its reinsurance allocation, according to the fund's annual report

Proposed $750mn start-up Golub Capital Re (GCR) will look to build a book with a strong focus on US casualty as it targets a gradual premium build-up of lower volatility business, The Insurance Insider can reveal

Floridian insurer Universal Property & Casualty has cut back its quota share arrangement with Odyssey Re and seen Everest Re removed from the treaty altogether as it cut spending on its core catastrophe reinsurance programme by 20 percent for 2014-2015

Bermudian reinsurers ceded a significantly higher proportion of their business to retro writers in the first quarter of 2014, thereby taking advantage of falling rates, an analysis of their recent results shows

Proposed Bermudian start-up reinsurer Golub Capital Re has engaged Travelers as a potential strategic partner as it continues on its path toward a targeted launch this summer, The Insurance Insider can reveal.

Pure underwriting capacity is increasingly a commodity, according to AIG property and casualty CEO Peter Hancock

Property cat reinsurance rates in the Sunshine State fell sharply at the 1 June renewal, with broader coverage as competition intensified. IQ investigates