Marsh: rates stable in Q3
Despite significant insurance losses in the first half of the year, insurers have remained “competitive but cautious”, according to Marsh.
In its third-quarter 2011 market update, the broker notes that while rates remained relatively stable, reductions were common in many lines.
However, losses earlier in the year meant that even property programmes not affected by losses, but with catastrophe exposures, typically renewed with increases of up to 10%, whereas non-catastrophe exposed programmes generally renewed flat.
In Japan, rates continued to rise significantly with increases of up to 50% on Japanese insurance programmes with losses, and increases of 20% on loss-free programmes.
For renewals in Australia, which suffered flooding losses in the early part of 2011, increases of up to 5% were generally seen on programmes without losses and not involved in mining, Marsh reports.
Globally, most casualty business renewed either flat or with small decreases.
For example, the North American casualty market remained predominantly flat, and in liability lines rates decreases were common.
For directors and officers liability insurance, almost all major markets, with the exception of China, reported declining rates.
Likewise, rates for professional indemnity insurance and for liability cover for financial institutions fell in almost all major geographies.
Marsh’s US risk practices leader, Dean Klisura, sums up: “Across lines of business, insurers priced risks competitively and retained a healthy appetite for new business.”
The report also identifies the European sovereign debt crisis as another risk for insurers and reinsurers, with exposure potentially coming through holdings in sovereign securities; corporate bond or equity holdings in exposed companies; or cash holdings.
Category: Insurance News, Marsh News
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