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.
RSA decides not to appeal against BI court ruling
21st October 2020
Multinational insurance group RSA has decided not to appeal against the UK High Court's decision in a recent ruling on the COVID-19 business interruption (BI) case brought forward by the FCA. The court largely sided with policyholders in the landmark case, meaning UK insurers are expected to pay out on ... Read the full article
Munich Re adds €800mn of COVID-19-related losses in Q3
20th October 2020
Global reinsurer Munich Re has added a further €800 million of COVID-19-related losses in its reinsurance operation in the third-quarter of 2020, taking its total for the first nine months of the year to €2.3 billion. The German reinsurer explains that the losses were attributable to various lines of business, including ... Read the full article
COVID-19 non-life insured loss in Germany seen at up to €1.75bn: E+S Rück
20th October 2020
The impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is expected to result in a non-life re/insurance market loss of between €1.25 billion to €1.75 billion (USD 1.47bn - USD 2.1bn) in Germany, driven mostly by nationwide business closures, according to executives at E+S Rückversicherung AG, the Hannover Re subsidiary responsible for ... Read the full article
Low interest rates impacting profitability of reinsurers, says Munich Re
19th October 2020
After years of eroding rates from excess capacities and low major-loss expenditure, Munich Re says low interest rates, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, are impacting the profitability of reinsurers. As a result, insurance covers are likely to become more expensive, particularly for long-term risks in third-party liability and other lines. Munich Re ... Read the full article
Parametric triggers the solution to pandemic backstop: Third Point Re’s Tracey Gibbons
19th October 2020
While it is clear that the enormous risks posed by future pandemics can only be tackled through public-private partnerships, the solutions proposed so far fail to fully contend with the scope and complexity of a global systemic threat of this nature. This is where parametric triggers come in, says Third Point ... Read the full article
COVID-19 tail unclear, but we’ve much further to travel in casualty: Willis Re
16th October 2020
While insurers and reinsurers looked to book much of their pandemic losses in the second-quarter, the potential for casualty lines development could persist for years and be very significant, according to executives at reinsurance broker Willis Re. It's likely to be years before we understand the full impact of the ongoing ... Read the full article
COVID losses to converge towards industry estimates in Q3: Berenberg
16th October 2020
While total insured COVID-19 losses still remain substantially below the consensus industry loss estimates, analysts at Berenberg expect the figures to begin to converge over the Q3 reporting season. Insurance losses reported to date stand at around $25 billion, which is far short of the lower end of Berenberg’s estimate ($50-70 ... Read the full article
COVID wordings gap could hurt some insurers: AM Best
14th October 2020
Analysts at AM Best have warned that gaps in policy wording around the COVID-19 pandemic could still hurt some primary insurers, despite recent efforts to exclude coverage. The rating agency noted that reinsurers were quick to react with exclusionary language during the mid-year renewals, due to concerns about the aggregation of ... Read the full article
AM Best lends weight to pandemic backstop agenda
13th October 2020
Rating agency AM Best has become the latest industry body to voice support for tackling future pandemic risk through public-private partnership. In a new report, analysts noted that insurers are likely to face significant reserve uncertainty arising from the current accident year due to the challenge of estimating COVID-19 losses. Social inflation, ... Read the full article
BoE reaches out to insurers over possibility of negative interest rates
13th October 2020
The Bank of England has reached out to all Prudential Regulation Authority-regulated insurers in an effort to understand firms’ operational readiness for the possibility of zero to negative interest rates. In August, the BoE’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) noted that it would continue to assess the appropriateness of a negative official ... Read the full article
Inflation bad for non-life, good for life: Berenberg
12th October 2020
Analysts at Berenberg have examined the recent data on inflation and its potential impact on profit margins in life and non-life insurance. While the COVID-19 crisis is associated with weak and falling GDP, and with deflation rather than inflation, analysts note how correlation works in reverse too: deflation is a risk for ... Read the full article
Life re/insurers under pressure as COVID-19 mortality estimates rise
12th October 2020
Analysts at Credit Suisse have raised their full-year COVID-19 mortality estimate for the US to 275,000, having previously issued a figure of 210,000 in July. The firm says the significant increase in mortalities due to the pandemic could increase the impact to US life re/insurers. Credit Suisse’s estimates now reflect roughly 80,000 ... Read the full article
COVID-19 changing term claims trends, risk exposures long-term: AGCS
9th October 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic will likely cause claims trends and risk exposures to evolve in the mid-and long-term, according to a report from Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty (AGCS). The report notes how, with the reduction in economic activity during lockdown phases, traditional property and liability claims have been subdued, most notably ... Read the full article
Unemployment tops infectious diseases as main concern for business execs: WEF
8th October 2020
Unemployment has topped out infectious diseases as the main concern for business executives globally, according to a World Economic Forum survey. Fiscal crisis was the top concern in 2019 but came third in this year's survey, which included responses from business leaders in regions including East Asia and the Pacific, Eurasia, Europe, Latin ... Read the full article
Industry will never get back to a pre-COVID ‘normal’: IGI’s Waleed Jabsheh
5th October 2020
From an operational point of view, the re/insurance industry is unlikely to ever return to the ‘normal’ it was accustomed to before the COVID-19 pandemic. This is according to Waleed Jabsheh, President of IGI, who discussed the challenges of the coronavirus crisis in a recent interview with Reinsurance News. “This experience has ... Read the full article
Getting your daily reinsurance news from Reinsurance News is a simple way to receive only the reinsurance industry news that matters, delivered directly to your email inbox.
