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20th January 2019

Newslink Global Insurance Trends-The Week

This week, as confusion continues over the future of Brexit, Huw Evans, director general of the Association of British Insurers(ABI) said “We need a way forward urgently that avoids no-deal. This is uncharted territory and we face a period of unprecedented uncertainty. It is critical that the Government, Parliament and the EU work together to avoid an outcome that would be bad for our economies and bad for our customers.” Bruce Hepburn, ceo, Mactavish, commented that “A bad Brexit is likely to lead to heightened business interruption risks, and a surge in D&O claims, many of which will be rejected by insurers." Specialist insurance lawyers Clyde & Co also weighed in with a couple of points. Allianz Risk Barometer highlighted cyber and concerns around Brexit as top risks in UK, which followed an EEF/AIG survey the week before that also identified Brexit and rising cyber as the most significant business risks for manufacturers. Mactavish highlighted significant flaws in many specialist cyber insurance policies.
The World Economic Forum(WEF) Global Risks Report 2019 highlighted worsening international relations hindering action across a growing array of serious challenges, and Willis Re's Summary of Natural Catastrophe Events 2018 report estimated insured losses from major natural catastrophes at around $71.5bn. UK Comprehensive car insurance prices fell by 6% in 2018 according to Confused.com/ Willis Towers Watson latest analysis.
Marsh announced that it had placed more than 10,000 risks in 2018 through Placing Platform Limited(PPL) making over 15,000 in total, whilst the International Underwriting Association(IUA) appointed a consultant to help its member companies make the most of their use of central London Market processing services. The Insurance Fraud Bureau(IFB) launched its new fraud prevention platform powered by analytics specialist SAS. ArgoGlobal is collaborating with broker Axieme and digital platform Jobby in Italy to respond to a need for on-demand, pay-as-you-go insurance for temporary and short-term workers, and Chinese insurer ZhongAn and Grab are to establish a joint venture company to enter the digital insurance distribution business in Southeast Asia. LV= General Insurance successfully deployed Guidewire Core and Data solutions in the largest transformation the business has ever undertaken, and Japanese insurer Rakuten chose Guidewire ClaimCenter solution for its automobile insurance business. Majesco released a new thought leadership report-"InsurTech: Energizing the Shift to Digital Insurance 2.0."
BIBA highlighted opportunities for business in its 2019 Manifesto. The GFIA commented on the IAIS paper on recovery planning, and Insurance Europe expressed concern that the European Commission’s proposal for an ePrivacy Regulation could hamper insurers’ ability to offer innovative insurance policies to consumers.
The Co-operative Group is to sell its general insurance business to Markerstudy. Swiss Re estimated its natural catastrophe and man-made claims for the fourth quarter at around $1.3bn net and $2.9bn for 2018, and Re also appointed Archie Kane as non-executive chairman of its closed book business ReAssure, with an IPO anticipated this year. There were a range of senior appointments at Guy Carpenter resulting from the Marsh McLennan acquisition of JLT and a new Global Capital Solutions Group was formed.
Full articles on the above topics are included in those added this week to the Newslink Global Trends Database Matrix Resource at www.onlystrategic.com