Latest Trends Headlines
All the headlines from our Trends Topic Page, ordered by recency.
As Insurance Rates Rise, Missisippians Urged to Take Mitigation Seriously
Apr 15 2011 // Mississippi Gulf Coast residents have been told mitigation is the answer to the region’s high insurance rates. “What do you do to lower rates? It is pretty simple. If you want to lower rates on the Gulf Coast,...
Survey Shows Opportunity for Carriers to Support Agents in Social Media
Apr 14 2011 // The majority of agents and brokers say using social media is important for business, yet many report not using social media tools in their business today. Seven of 10 independent agents and brokers believe it is important...
U.S. Shuts Down Massive Cyber Theft Ring
Apr 14 2011 // U.S. authorities claimed one of their biggest victories against cyber crime as they shut down a ring they said used malicious software to take control of more than 2 million PCs around the world, and may have led to theft...
Insurance Fraud Claims on Rise in New York
Apr 13 2011 // Suspicious insurance claims in New York were up about 4.5 percent in 2010, an industry report shows. In 2010, insurers reported a total of 7,026 questionable claims in the state, compared with 6,726 in 2009, according to...
Massachusetts Workers’ Compensation Rates Not Going Up
Apr 13 2011 // Massachusetts regulators and insurers have agreed that workers’ compensation rates will not rise. Last month, the industry filed for a 6.6 percent average increase effective Sept. 1 but insurers have agreed to hold...
Japan Insured Losses Up to $34 Billion: RMS
Apr 12 2011 // The March 11 Japan earthquake and tsunami are likely to have caused up to $34 billion in losses for the global insurance industry, catastrophe modeling company RMS said Tuesday. RMS said the magnitude 9.0 quake and...
A.M. Best Revises Outlook for The Hartford
Apr 12 2011 // A.M. Best Co. has revised the outlook to stable from negative and affirmed the issuer credit rating (ICR) of “bbb+” of The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. A.M. Best also has affirmed the financial...
Florida Approves 18.8% State Farm Rate Increase
Apr 12 2011 // Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty has approved a statewide average 18.8 percent rate increase in State Farm’s homeowners’ policies, which is roughly 10 percent below the 27.9 percent it initially...
How Rising Energy Prices Affect P/C Insurance
Apr 11 2011 // The leveling off of the world’s oil supply and the resulting rising gasoline prices and their economic impact carry implications for property/casualty insurance rates. Oil spikes have been known to precede...
Workers’ Comp Costs per Claim Rise in Minnesota
Apr 8 2011 // Workers’ compensation costs per claim for injured workers in Minnesota have grown, but at a slower pace than other study states, according to a study by the Workers Compensation Research Institute...
‘Above Average’ 2011 Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast
Apr 7 2011 // The 2011 Atlantic hurricane season will be above average with nine hurricanes, five of them major, with a more than 70 percent chance that at least one of them will hit the U.S. coastline, Colorado State University...
Calif. Workers’ Comp Rating Bureau Could Recommend 40% Rate Increase
Apr 6 2011 // The Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California is discussing a pure premium rate increase of up to 40 percent at today’s Governing Committee meeting, according to industry reports. The WCIRB...
Survey Shows Agents Concerned on Perpetuation; Few Take Action
Apr 6 2011 // The majority of agents and brokers today worry about how to perpetuate their firm to future owners, yet few agency owners report having a perpetuation plan in place. New findings in the forthcoming survey “2011...
Reinsurance Rates Rising, But Few Agree Where, How Much
Apr 6 2011 // Reinsurance rates may be edging higher only now, but the companies’ shares could still surge amid investor hopes that disasters, including Japan’s earthquake, will result in much higher rates in the...
Texas Sees Rise in Workers’ Comp Medical Cost per Claim
Apr 6 2011 // Medical costs per claim in Texas rose 8 percent in 2008, after a period of declining costs following reforms enacted in 2001 and 2005, and increased payor focus on managing medical care, according to a study by the Workers...
Reinsurance Rates Are Rising, but Few Agree Where
Apr 6 2011 // Reinsurance rates may be edging higher only now, but the companies’ shares could still surge amid investor hopes that disasters, including Japan’s earthquake, will result in much higher rates in the...
Aon Analysis Finds Airlines Seeing Passenger Numbers Increasing in 2011
Apr 5 2011 // According to Aon Risk Solutions, recently released “Airline Insurance Market Outlook, 2011,” the Aon airline industry has “started to recover since the darkest days of the financial crisis, with rising...
Survey Finds Structurally Deficient Montana Bridges
Apr 5 2011 // A new survey finds one of every 13 highway bridges in Montana is structurally deficient, and that an average of 80,000 motorists a day cross what the report ranks as the top three busiest bridges in the state that are in...
State Farm Denied Rate Hike in Louisiana; Citizens Gets 6.5% Increase
Apr 4 2011 // Louisiana insurance regulators rejected a rate increase from the state’s largest insurer of homes, but the board of the state’s property insurer of last resort approved a rate hike, albeit smaller than the one...
The Future of the Independent Agency (Has Nothing to Do with Age)
Apr 4 2011 // Young Ownership Challenged by Carriers Unwilling to Hand Out Contracts to Start Ups For the last 20 years, at least, consultants, associations and publications have been worrying about the future of the independent agency...
