Streaming now on The ReInsurer TV!

The ReInsurer is conducting a series of video interviews throughout September as part of our REinsurance Month coverage, asking industry leaders for their views on the latest topics and trends leading up to the 1 January renewal.

As we’ve been closely reporting, there are a number of factors shaping the upcoming renewal discussions and (re)insurance activity more generally, and it is indeed, a brave new world we look towards as we draw closer to the end of what has been a remarkable 2020 and begin to think about what’s in store for us all in 2021.

In the past week, we’ve interviewed – both virtually and in some (wonderful) instances face-to-face – some familiar senior executives, prevalent movers and shakers and future ones to watch, amalgamating the intel from those who are best informed on what’s in store for the industry in our exclusive video series which can be viewed online.

We heard from Arch Re CEO Maamoun Rajeh who has thrown his support behind a “mortgage-style” publicprivate partnership as a means to enable the industry to respond to future pandemic risks.

Speaking to The ReInsurer, the executive pointed to the current government-backed mortgage model in the US as a successful public-private partnership and a pre-existing structure that could be used to provide coverage for future pandemics.

We also heard from Swiss Re’s Jonathan Isherwood who believes that Covid-19, the impact of normal peril losses including most recently Hurricane Laura and the yield environment provide an inflection point for the market that will drive further hardening.

Anne Middleton, head of ceded reinsurance and capital modelling at Convex, said the hardening market conditions present an opportunity for Convex to “refine” its portfolio through reinsurance buying.

She highlighted “nuances” within current operating conditions which are influencing how the London-Bermuda specialty carrier thinks about portfolio optimisation.

With closer attention being paid on the US casualty market, Kenneth Brandt, co-president of TransRe Americas, told The ReInsurer the market still needs more pricing improvement over and above what has already been imposed as it strives to get a handle on the adverse reserve development emanating from the 2013 to 2018 prior years.

For Steve McGill, founder and CEO of McGill & Partners, building out into the reinsurance broking space is a “no brainer” for the ambitious new broker.

He told The ReInsurer: “The opportunities in reinsurance broking are significant. Market conditions have changed quite profoundly as carriers, insurance companies and Lloyd’s syndicates look for innovative solutions both on the treaty and facultative side of the business.”

Referring to the Aon-Willis Towers Watson deal as the “biggest structural change in broker history”, McGill said he anticipates further “knockon effects” to play out in 2021, predicting a lot of “interesting and positive times” for McGill & Partners.

Back at Convex, deputy CEO Paul Brand, shed some light on the group’s feelings on Lloyd’s. Brand said that while Lloyd’s remains “entirely central” to the London Market, Convex would be “constrained” at Lloyd’s.

“We’re a rapidly growing company and we’re trying to seize the opportunity the market is offering to us with both hands”, he explained. “We’d be a little bit constrained at Lloyd’s. I think Lloyd’s would add complexity that perhaps we don’t need at the moment.”