Latest Carriers Headlines

All the headlines from our Carriers Topic Page, ordered by recency.

Financial and Housing Crises, Soft Market to Challenge Insurers in 2009

Dec 4 2008 // The financial and housing crises, along with a prolonged soft market, are converging to create a highly challenging environment for the U.S. insurance industry in 2009, says an industry think tank. These factors will force...

Premium Rating Errors Cost Auto Insurers $16 Billion, Report Claims

Dec 4 2008 // Premium rating errors by insurance companies resulted in the loss of $16.1 billion of auto insurance premium revenues in 2007, slightly down from the 2006 figure of $16.6 billion — but still almost 10 percent of the...

Insurers Urge Surcharges, Reforms to Fix North Carolina Beach Plan

Dec 3 2008 // Property/casualty insurers are urging North Carolina officials to impose surcharges on policies in the state’s residual market property insurer, the Beach Plan, and take other financing and mitigation steps to...

Keystone Insurers Group Honors 3 Agency Partners

Dec 3 2008 // Keystone Insurers Group (KIG), the fourth largest privately held property/casualty insurance agency in America and an Insurance Journal Top 100 Agency, announced the recipients of its fifth annual KIG Exemplary Awards. The...

Mississippi Insurance Chief Chaney Reports Progress in Rebuilding Markets

Dec 3 2008 // One year after he was elected, Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney says his state has made progress in rebuilding its insurance markets that were ruined by the 2005 hurricanes. Mississippi has done this by...

Best Releases Study of Asian Insurers

Dec 2 2008 // A.M. best Co. has issued a new study of Asian insurance companies, which concludes that they “are expected to avoid major liquidity problems stemming from the global financial crisis, but investment income will...

Donegal Group Acquires Sheboygan Falls Insurance Company

Dec 2 2008 // Donegal Group Inc. recently reported that it had completed the acquisition of all of the outstanding capital stock of Sheboygan Falls Insurance Co. The acquisition was approximately $12 million, which includes a surplus...

Insurers Ponder Risk of Encouraging Trees to Fight Global Warming

Dec 1 2008 // Paying landowners to let forests grow is promoted by the United Nations as a viable way to fight global warming, but experts first have to puzzle out how to insure trees against going up in smoke. Under U.N. plans, owners...

China Insurers Dodge Financial Crisis Bullet, But Risks Loom

Dec 1 2008 // China’s 3 trillion yuan ($440 billion) insurance industry was largely insulated from the U.S. subprime crisis that battered AIG and other foreign firms, but the fallout poses the toughest challenge in a decade as...

Florida Workers’ Compensation Insurers Seek 8.9% Rate Hike Due to Court Ruling

Nov 30 2008 // A Florida Supreme Court ruling has resulted in a request to raise workers compensation rates by 8.9 percent. The National Council on Compensation Insurance filed the request, citing last month’s ruling in which...

Time to Sue

Nov 30 2008 // Contractual Limitations Provisions in Insurance Policies: What Every Agent and Broker Needs to Know Generally, the statute of limitations for the breach of an oral agreement is four years. However, a shorter period is...

All Claims Are Local

Nov 30 2008 // Multinational Claims Require Knowledge of Culture, Currency and Legal Climate In today’s borderless global economy, claims can arise in just about any part of the world where a company does business. Even small and...

New York Warns Insurers about Some Homeowners’ Cancellations

Nov 30 2008 // New York’s Department of Insurance has this advice for insurers in the Empire State: Stop canceling homeowners’ policies simply because a house in unoccupied. That announcement came in the form a circular...

Lloyd’s Conference Finds Progress in Insurers Efforts on Climate Change

Nov 26 2008 // Over 100 representatives from the financial services sector met at Lloyd’s on Nov. 24 to listen to what the insurance industry has been doing to combat climate change. The conference, held for the first time this...

Treasury Undecided Over Federal Bailout Funds for Life Insurers

Nov 26 2008 // Life insurance companies, nervous over massive investment losses that could ultimately threaten their viability, are hoping they are next in line to get a piece of the U.S. financial bailout. They argue federal funds could...

In Florida, Insurers Thankful No Major Hurricane Tested State Fund

Nov 25 2008 // As the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season officially comes to a close this on Nov. 30, Florida can be thankful for being spared from any major hurricane strike again this season. However, the dangers hurricanes present and the...

New York Reminds Insurers They Must Treat All Married Couples Equally

Nov 25 2008 // Insurance companies must treat same-sex couples in New York who were legally married outside the state the same as any other validly married couples, irrespective of the sex of the spouses, Insurance Superintendent Eric...

China Life Interested in Acquring AIG Asia Assets

Nov 24 2008 // China Life Insurance Co, the world’s biggest life insurer by market value, is interested in buying Asian assets of American International Group, a senior China Life manager briefed on the situation said on...

AEGON’s Bid for TARP Cash Doomed

Nov 21 2008 // A Dutch insurer’s experimental bid to tap the U.S. government for bailout cash looks doomed to failure, closing off an avenue for other insurers. Aegon NV said this week it was mulling buying a small U.S. bank to...

Oklahoma Physician Liability Insurer Declares Policyholder Dividends

Nov 21 2008 // Oklahoma City-based Physicians Liability Insurance Company (PLICO), announced it is declaring a dividend for its 2008 policyholders who renew their policies for 2009. The dividend will be either 3 percent or 6 percent of...