Reinsurance News
Coronavirus news
Coronavirus news coverage of relevance to reinsurance and insurance markets.
All of our Covid-19 coronavirus news, analysis and insight related to insurance and reinsurance market impacts can be found below.
The coronavirus Covid-19 pandemic of 2019-20 resulted in significant disruption and threatened losses widely across the insurance and reinsurance markets.
IAG set for sizeable capital raise following $865mn pandemic BI hit
20th November 2020
Australian insurance group IAG intends to recognise a $865 million hit from pandemic-related business interruption claims and as a result will be looking to raise $750 million in new equity capital. IAG’s announcement follows a NSW Court of Appeal ruling that insurers could not decline business interruption claims due to incorrectly ... Read the full article
COVID-19 disrupting US professional liability market: AM Best
20th November 2020
Rating agency AM Best has released a new report showing how the COVID-19 pandemic has created disruption for underwriters in each of the US professional liability insurance market lines. Earlier this year, after the initial pandemic surge in the US, AM Best had placed a negative rating against the professional liability ... Read the full article
Lloyd’s expects industry-wide COVID losses to exceed $107bn estimate: reports
19th November 2020
The Chairman of Lloyd's of London, Bruce Carnegie-Brown, said at a recent Reuters event that the global insured loss from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic will exceed the market's previous estimate of $107 billion. Back in May, the specialist insurance and reinsurance marketplace said that it expects to pay customers up to ... Read the full article
COVID-19 leads PCS’ Johansmeyer’s ‘Four Horsemen of 2021’
18th November 2020
With one of the year's biggest and busiest holiday's approaching, and the likelihood of any possible COVID-19 vaccine easing the pressure in the near-future low, the next six-to-eight weeks are going to be vital in more accurately gauging what PCS' Tom Johansmeyer expects to be a tough year for reinsurers. Read the full article
Suncorp expecting broadly neutral COVID-19 impact across first half of FY
17th November 2020
The impact of COVID-19 across Suncorp’s general insurance portfolio is expected to be broadly neutral for the first half of the 2021 financial year. Impacts during this period include an assessment for potential business interruption (BI) claims from the second Victorian lockdown. Additionally, temporary short- term reductions in motor claims frequency, continued ... Read the full article
Pandemic related reinsurance losses fading in 9M20, Fitch suggests
16th November 2020
Fitch Ratings’ reinsurance dashboard for the first nine months of 2020 suggests pandemic-related losses have started to fade. Hannover Rueck SE, SCOR and Swiss Re all booked fewer pandemic-related claims reserves in 3Q20 than in 2Q20, as the actual loss experience did not require any major adjustments to expected claims in ... Read the full article
COVID-19 could see Lloyd’s look more like a coffee shop again: Carnegie-Brown
16th November 2020
In a recent interview with the Mail on Sunday, Lloyd's of London Chairman Bruce Carnegie-Brown remarked how the historic re/insurance market could end up looking more like a coffee shop again. It's well known that Lloyd's, the oldest insurance market in the world, started life as a coffee shop some 334 ... Read the full article
Human behaviour critical to pandemic & cyber modelling: CyberCube
16th November 2020
A new report by cyber analytics provider CyberCube stresses the importance of understanding and predicting human behaviour when it comes to modelling both pandemic and cyber risk. According to the report, which sets out to understand the lessons both pandemic and cyber modelers could learn from each other, the potential for ... Read the full article
Pandemic is insurable, government actions are not: Prospectus 2021
13th November 2020
During the opening panel of the Prospectus 2021 online conference, David Flandro, Managing Director at Hyperion X Analytics argued that the private market is fully capable of handling pandemic risk, but not the accompanying government actions. Prospectus 2021, the new annual conference by Reinsurance News and Artemis, kicked off yesterday ... Read the full article
Pandemic shock less severe than feared for re/insurers: Swiss Re
11th November 2020
A new sigma study by Swiss Re is forecasting global insurance premium growth of 3.4% in real terms in 2021, following a contraction of 1.4% this year due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The decline was less severe than the 2.8% drop predicted by Swiss Re earlier this year, ... Read the full article
BI dispute has hurt industry reputation: Markel’s Richie Whitt
10th November 2020
Richie Whitt, Co-CEO of Markel, has warned that the re/insurance industry’s response to the dispute around COVID-19 business interruption (BI) claims may have a long-term negative impact on its reputation. Speaking with Andy Marcell, CEO of Reinsurance Solutions at Aon, as part of the broker’s series of virtual ‘fireside chats’, Whitt ... Read the full article
Life & health risks from pandemics are insurable: The Geneva Association
10th November 2020
New research by The Geneva Association finds that life and health risks for pandemics similar to COVID-19 are insurable, but warns that property and casualty (P&C) risks remain too large for the private market. There has been a wide-spread public discussion on how to address the deep financial implications of COVID-19, ... Read the full article
COVID losses “by no means over,” warn experts
9th November 2020
Executive panellists at the S&P Global Reinsurance Conference have warned that re/insurance industry losses due to COVID-19 are “by no means over.” Charles Mathias, Group Executive Director and Group Chief Risk Officer at Fidelis Insurance Holdings, suggested that many companies may have reserved on the basis that the pandemic would be ... Read the full article
Falling reinsurance capital supply could see hard market last multiple years: Jefferies
4th November 2020
With Munich Re estimating a 7.4% fall in reinsurance capital supply, and a significant proportion of outstanding alternative capital already encumbered by losses, analysts at Jefferies believe the expected hard market could last multiple years. Though alternative capital remains above $90 billion, analysts note how a material proportion is now locked ... Read the full article
COVID health caution helps insurers to record profits in Q2: AM Best
4th November 2020
According to analysts at AM Best, health insurers reported record profits during the second quarter of 2020 despite the pandemic, due to deferral of care and an increased reluctance to visit healthcare providers. The healthcare industry faced many unforeseen challenges and changes in early 2020 due to the onset of the ... Read the full article
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