Latest Market Headlines
All the headlines from our Market Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Insurers Unprepared for Self-Driving Car Disruption: KPMG
Aug 3 2015 // The majority of property/casualty insurers do not expect autonomous or self-driving vehicles to have a real impact on their auto insurance business for another decade and have not adjusted their business models to prepare...
Best Analyzes Changes to Brazilian Local Reinsurance Market
Jul 31 2015 // A.M. Best has released a new briefing focusing on the National Council of Private Insurance issuance of CNSP Resolution CNSP No. 322, which decreases the amount of premiums that Brazil’s local insurers must...
MMC CEO Glaser Surveys Competitive Landscape in Wake of Consolidation
Jul 29 2015 // Recent merger deals in the insurance industry among its competitors and carrier partners should not hurt Marsh & McLennan (MMC) and could instead make its insurance and reinsurance advisory services even more...
Insurers Warned to ‘Think Before You Snap’ as Florida Drone Privacy Law Takes Flight
Jul 29 2015 // The new Florida drone privacy law could have some unintended consequences for insurers looking to use or insure unmanned aircraft systems (UAM) technology. The Freedom from Unwarranted Surveillance Act (FUSA), which took...
Lloyd’s Supports Natural Catastrophe Resilience Plan Across Asia
Jul 28 2015 // As he prepared to sign a Statement of Intent (SOI) between the British Government, the Monetary Authority of Singapore and Lloyd’s in Singapore, UK Prime Minister David Cameron stressed that insurance is essential to...
How P/C Insurance Industry Fared in First Quarter
Jul 21 2015 // The U.S. property/casualty insurance industry managed to improve its underwriting results and attain higher net investment income to produce a 12.9 percent increase in pre-tax operating income in the first quarter of 2015...
Global Reform of Tax Systems to Hit Insurance Industry: London’s IUA
Jul 20 2015 // A sweeping global reform of tax systems is under way and will have profound implications for the insurance industry, the London-based International Underwriting Association has warned. Responding to public concerns about...
Re/insurance Market Conditions Will Lead to More M&A Activity: A.M. Best
Jul 20 2015 // Merger and takeover activity is likely to continue in the coming months as re/insurers increasingly seek ways to deploy capital and create scale against a backdrop of ongoing soft market conditions and weak investment...
Midwest – People
Jul 20 2015 // Church Mutual Insurance Co., based in Merrill, Wis., added Laura J. Hughes as chief marketing officer. She has more than 20 years of experience and an emphasis on the financial services industry. Prior to joining Church...
Near National P/C Carriers Identified for 2015
Jul 20 2015 // The Demotech Company Classification System, established in the Feb. 12, 2007 issue of Insurance Journal, categorizes insurers into one of 11 categories based on an analysis of data reported by the companies to the National...
How the Insurance Industry Is Using Google Glass
Jul 20 2015 // Improved customer service may be just one benefit insurers could see by using Google Glass in their operations. Michael Clifton, vice president of Insurance for Cognizant, described some of the benefits in the...
Report Sees Major Food Shortage as Climate Change Danger
Jul 16 2015 // Climate change reports and studies abound lately – as you will note from a previous column – but one recent report gives potentially the starkest prediction yet of what impacts climate change could have. The report...
Allianz: Hedge Funds Are Opportunity for Insurance Industry, Not Threat
Jul 16 2015 // Chris Fischer Hirs, the head of Allianz SE’s specialty insurance business, said he welcomes the growing participation of Wall Street in the insurance industry as an opportunity, not a threat. “Hedge funds bring...
Poll: Is ACE-Chubb Deal Good or Bad?
Jul 15 2015 // The insurance industry believes that on the whole, the ACE Ltd. acquisition of Chubb Corp. is a good deal. Industry professionals see the deal as perhaps better for the parties involved than for the property/casualty...
Xuber’s Bermuda Roundtable White Paper Summarizes Executives’ View of M&A
Jul 15 2015 // Xuber, Xchanging’s insurance software business, has gathered a report, which reveals that “insurance executives in Bermuda are questioning the long-term benefits of the current spate of mergers and acquisitions...
UK Insurers Ponder Implications of Premium Tax Increase
Jul 14 2015 // The unexpected announcement in UK Chancellor George Osborn’s budget, which would raise the Insurance Premium Tax (IPT) from 6 percent to 9.5 percent starting in November, poses a problem for UK-based insurers. David...
Exposing Insurance Frauds Saves UK Customers $5.588 Million a Day: ABI Study
Jul 13 2015 // The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has published figures showing that £3.6 million [$5.588 Million] a day is being “saved by exposing insurance cheats.” It is only one of the “factors helping to...
Rincón to Head New W. R. Berkley Subsidiary-Berkley Int’l Seguros Colombia
Jul 8 2015 // W. R. Berkley Corporation announced the formation of Berkley International Seguros Colombia S.A., which it said would “provide a full range of commercial insurance products, including construction all risk, surety,...
P/C Direct Premium Written Up Nearly 4 Percent
Jul 6 2015 // Direct premium written (DPW) for property/casualty insurance companies continues to increase, albeit gradually. At year-end 2014, more than $570 billion of DPW was reported, a record-high for the industry. For 2014, total...
Plugging the Hole in the U.S. Flood Market: How Risk Modelers Can Help to De-Risk the NFIP
Jul 6 2015 // The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) has long been the dominant player in the U.S. flood insurance market, providing subsidized flood insurance based on actuarially unsound rates for millions of property owners, in...
