1. GC Securities*: First Quarter Cat Bond Activity Signals Robust Issuance Ahead: GC Securities released an analysis of first quarter activity and trends within the catastrophe risk market for 2013. Two natural peril-exposed catastrophe bond transactions closed during the first quarter of 2013, for a total of USD520 million of issuance. This seemingly low level of primary issuance activity is deceiving, however, as activity in the capital markets and the influence of “non-traditional” capacity - a term that is rapidly approaching obsolescence - has never been higher.

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2. Chart: Global Natural Catastrophe Losses: The extent of rising insured losses from global natural catastrophes over the last 40 years is illustrated below.

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3. April 1 Renewals See Reinsurance Pricing Stabilize Amid Dynamic Capital Growth: Guy Carpenter reports that dynamic capital growth and ample reinsurance capacity resulted in a relatively stable renewal at April 1, 2013. In a briefing released today, Guy Carpenter comments that the convergence of traditional and alternative capital sources is changing the marketplace, with non-traditional capacity now making up an estimated 14 percent of global property catastrophe limit.

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4. Chart: 2013 144A Catastrophe Bond Issuance: Details on each transaction completed during 2013 year to date are presented.

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5. Guy Carpenter Asia-Pacific Climate Impact Centre Publishes Fourth Annual Report on Climate Issues: The Guy Carpenter Asia-Pacific Climate Impact Centre (GCACIC), a joint initiative of Guy Carpenter and City University of Hong Kong, today released its fourth annual report presenting the findings of the GCACIC’s research activities from the past year. The report details the findings of 22 projects conducted by the GCACIC, which focus on climate problems in the Asia-Pacific region as well as on a global scale.

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6. Chart: Catastrophe Bond Issuance by Quarter: During the first quarter of 2013 two natural peril-exposed catastrophe bond transactions closed, for a total of USD520 million of issuance.

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7. Recent Terrorism Stories on GC Capital Ideas: Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas stories that cover terrorism.

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8. Chart: Estimated Reinsurance Premium (Including Life) Growth by Region: While reinsurance premiums remained broadly stable in the established markets of the United States, Canada and Western Europe between 2007 and 2011, strong growth has been recorded in emerging market regions, particularly China, India and other countries in South and East Asia.

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9. 2013 Reinsurance Renewals: As we look toward the June 1 reinsurance renewal next week, here we review the key GC Capital Ideas stories that have covered the prior renewals this year.

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10. Microinsurance on GC Capital Ideas: Here we review recent stories on GC Capital Ideas that covered microinsurance.

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* Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the United States through GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities Corp., a US registered broker-dealer and member FINRA/SIPC. Main Office: 1166 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036. Phone: (212) 345-5000. Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the European Union by GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd., which is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Reinsurance products are placed through qualified affiliates of Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC. MMC Securities Corp., MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd. and Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC are affiliates owned by Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc. This communication is not intended as an offer to sell or a solicitation of any offer to buy any security, financial instrument, reinsurance or insurance product.

1. April 1 Renewals See Reinsurance Pricing Stabilize amid Dynamic Capital Growth: Guy Carpenter reports that dynamic capital growth and ample reinsurance capacity resulted in a relatively stable renewal at April 1, 2013. In a briefing released today, Guy Carpenter comments that the convergence of traditional and alternative capital sources is changing the marketplace, with non-traditional capacity now making up an estimated 14 percent of global property catastrophe limit.

Read the article >>

2.  Chart: Five Most Expensive Earthquakes for Insurers: Over the last two years, several powerful earthquakes have caused widespread damage, leading to significant losses for (re)insurers. Four out of the five most costly earthquakes on record have occurred since the start of 2010, and all four of these events were located outside the United States.

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3. What About the “S” in ORSA? Actuaries Raise Their Hands: At the 2012 Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS) Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida, the general session, “Economic Capital Modeling for ORSA in the U.S. Property and Casualty (P&C) Industry:  The Stakeholders Convene,” afforded participants a novel opportunity to satisfy their continuing education credits. In that session, attendees hypothetically viewed the P&C industry as a single large company. Audience members were shareholders and session panelists adopted various executive and leadership roles in the company.

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4. Chart: Ratio of Insured Loss to Economic Loss from Recent Earthquake Events: Earthquake insurance coverage in developed and emerging economies varies widely, and earthquake coverage can be low, even in certain established markets. Of all the earthquakes that have caused economic losses over USD1 billion over the last three years, only events in New Zealand and Chile saw the (re)insurance sector contribute more than 25 percent of the overall cost.

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5.  January 1, 2013 Renewals Bring Stable Reinsurance Pricing: Guy Carpenter reports that the reinsurance sector enters 2013 equipped with ample dedicated capital and stable pricing. In its 2013 global renewal report, The Route to Profitable Growth, Guy Carpenter finds that the January 1, 2013 renewals took place against a stable backdrop, with only loss-affected lines and select regions experiencing price volatility. The market was supported by a combination of factors including lower than normal catastrophe losses during the first nine months of 2012, new reinsurance capacity and record-high levels of capital.

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6. Reinsurance Pricing Trends: Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas posts that have focused on 2013 reinsurance pricing trends.

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7. Oliver Wyman Report: Recovery and Resolution Plans for Insurers: When banks in Europe and the United States became unable to honor their financial obligations in 2007 and 2008, governments bailed them out. But why? The standard answer is that politicians faced a terrible choice. They had to choose between saving insolvent banks largely “as is” in the short-term, or unleashing economic chaos. Recovery and Resolutions Plans (RRPs) are supposed to stop such a dilemma arising again.

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8. Chart: Global Flood Risks and Flood Model Coverage by Three Main Modeling Vendors: Flood risk is poorly modeled at a global level, particularly in developing countries where flooding is a regular occurrence.

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9. Marsh United States Insurance Market Report 2013: Guy Carpenter sister company Marsh’s 2013 United States Insurance Report reveals that although U.S. commercial insurance rates are expected to continue firming in many lines of business and industry sectors in 2013, traditional signs of a conventional hard market are not evident as price increases are not uniform, capacity is plentiful and competition among insurers remains intense.

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10. Chart: Countries Operating Compulsory or Optional Terrorism Pools: A summary of the compulsory and optional terrorism pools that operate around the globe.

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1. Marsh United States Insurance Market Report 2013: Guy Carpenter sister company Marsh’s 2013 United States Insurance Report reveals that although U.S. commercial insurance rates are expected to continue firming in many lines of business and industry sectors in 2013, traditional signs of a conventional hard market are not evident as price increases are not uniform, capacity is plentiful and competition among insurers remains intense.

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2. January 1, 2013 Renewals Bring Stable Reinsurance Pricing: Guy Carpenter reports that the reinsurance sector enters 2013 equipped with ample dedicated capital and stable pricing. In its 2013 global renewal report, The Route to Profitable Growth, Guy Carpenter finds that the January 1, 2013 renewals took place against a stable backdrop, with only loss-affected lines and select regions experiencing price volatility. The market was supported by a combination of factors including lower than normal catastrophe losses during the first nine months of 2012, new reinsurance capacity and record-high levels of capital.

Read the article >>

3. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

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4. Tony Gallagher Appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Pacific Region for Guy Carpenter: Guy Carpenter announced that Tony Gallagher will be appointed Chief Executive Officer of the firm’s Pacific Region effective March 1, 2013. Mr. Gallagher will be based in Sydney and will report to James Nash, CEO of the firm’s Asia Pacific region.

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5. Extension of Guy Carpenter’s Asia Flood Model to China: Floods are among the most destructive hazards and as more people move to urban areas, flooding is having a growing impact on larger populations and economic losses.

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6. Solvency II on GC Capital Ideas: Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas stories that have touched on issues relating to the Solvency II regime.

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7. Chart Room: Reserve Cycle, General Liability Claims Made and Products Liability Claims Made: The lines have begun to show deteriorating results in the most recent accident years.

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8. BRIC Countries: Here we bring together recent GC Capital Ideas’ posts that have focused on the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries.

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9. Approaching April Renewals: As we approach the April 1 Japan reinsurance renewals, we review recent GC Capital Ideas stories focusing on Asia Pacific.

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10. Chart: Guy Carpenter Global Rate on Line Index, January 2013: The Guy Carpenter Global Property Catastrophe Reinsurance Rate on Line index fell marginally at the January 1, 2013, renewal. This is the seventh consecutive annual renewal in which changes to the index have equaled 10 percent or less, indicating a global market with capacity appropriate to meet demand.

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1. January 1, 2013 Renewals Bring Stable Reinsurance Pricing: Guy Carpenter reports that the reinsurance sector enters 2013 equipped with ample dedicated capital and stable pricing. In its 2013 global renewal report, The Route to Profitable Growth, Guy Carpenter finds that the January 1, 2013, renewals took place against a stable backdrop, with only loss-affected lines and select regions experiencing price volatility.

Read the article >>

2. Managing Catastrophe Model Uncertainty, Issues and Challenges: Uncertainty is ever present in the insurance business, and despite relentless enhancements in data gathering and processing power, it is still a large factor in risk modeling and assessment. This realization, driven home by model changes and recent unexpected natural catastrophes, can be disconcerting - even frightening - to industry participants. But companies that understand the vagaries of model uncertainty and take a disciplined, holistic approach to managing the catastrophe modeling process are well positioned to adapt and outperform the competition.

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3. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

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4. Floods in Eastern Australia: Ex-tropical cyclone Oswald tracked over parts of Queensland and New South Wales in eastern Australia between January 23 and January 30, resulting in widespread damage from flooding, severe storms and tornadoes. Floodwaters in some areas reached record levels, causing damage to thousands of properties and forcing widespread evacuations.

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5. Risk Preference Function - Embedding Risk-Reward in Capital Allocation: Capital allocation decisions are among the most important decisions made by company management. Through our own research and thought leadership and our observance of best practices at clients around the world, Guy Carpenter’s Enterprise Risk Management Advisory practice has compiled a set of leading practices around capital allocation for (re)insurers.

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6. Chart: Guy Carpenter Global Rate on Line Index, January 2013: The Guy Carpenter Global Property Catastrophe Reinsurance Rate on Line (ROL) index fell marginally at the January 1, 2013, renewal. This is the seventh consecutive annual renewal in which changes to the index have equaled 10 percent or less, indicating a global market with capacity appropriate to meet demand.

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7. The Growing Role of the Reinsurance Broker in the Life Market: Life and non-life reinsurance are different. One of the major differences is the prominence of the role of the reinsurance broker in non-life reinsurance - more than 75 percent of non-life business is transacted through brokers. This compares with only 5 percent transacted in life reinsurance. Why is there such a pronounced difference? And why is the life market developing a need for more frequent use of brokers?

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8. Convergence Trends: Here we present recent GC Capital Ideas stories that have discussed the concept of the convergence of traditional and non-traditional sources of capital.

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9. Guy Carpenter Launches MetaRisk® 7.1: Guy Carpenter today announced the release of MetaRisk® 7.1, the latest version of the firm’s premier risk and capital management decision making tool. The platform offers access to a variety of new features and enhancements that will improve usability, increase overall functionality and enable the development of more accurate and efficient risk and capital models.

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10. Capital Management Developments: Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas’ top stories on capital management.

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1. January 1, 2013 Renewals Bring Stable Reinsurance Pricing: Guy Carpenter reports that the reinsurance sector enters 2013 equipped with ample dedicated capital and stable pricing. In its 2013 global renewal report, The Route to Profitable Growth, Guy Carpenter finds that the January 1, 2013, renewals took place against a stable backdrop, with only loss-affected lines and select regions experiencing price volatility. The market was supported by a combination of factors including lower than normal catastrophe losses during the first nine months of 2012, new reinsurance capacity and record-high levels of capital.

Read the article >>

2. Chart: Guy Carpenter Global Rate on Line Index, January 2013: The Guy Carpenter Global Property Catastrophe Reinsurance Rate on Line (ROL) index fell marginally at the January 1, 2013, renewal. This is the seventh consecutive annual renewal in which changes to the index have equaled 10 percent or less, indicating a global market with capacity appropriate to meet demand.

Read the article >>

3. Risk Profile, Appetite and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

Read the article >>

4. Chart: Guy Carpenter Regional Rate on Line Index, January 2013: There was variation regionally in the Guy Carpenter Regional Property Catastrophe Reinsurance Rate on Line (ROL) index. U.S. property catastrophe pricing was most affected by the landfall of Superstorm Sandy while other regions were flat to down.

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5. Chart: Global Significant Insured Losses, 2011 to Q4 2012: 2012 insured losses in aggregate were “normal.”

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6. Terrorism: Merits of Reinsurance Protection: Although the need for the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007 (TRIPRA) is clear, reinsurance protection can help companies withstand the non-renewal or alteration of the program. Indeed, even though the federal backstop currently remains in place, some insurers have decided to further protect their balance sheet with reinsurance protections.

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7. Guy Carpenter Makes Senior Appointments in GC Securities: Guy Carpenter announced that Andrew Beecroft and Paul Rayner have been appointed as Managing Directors of GC Securities,* effective January 7, 2013.

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8. Chart: U.S. and Bermuda Property-Casualty M&A Activity, 2004 to 2012: For the property and casualty sector, market consolidation was at the periphery.

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9. Chart: Long-Term Evolution of Shareholders’ Funds, 1998 to Q3 2012: Dedicated reinsurance capital was at a record high immediately prior to Superstorm Sandy.

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10. Capital Model Trends: Here we highlight recent stories that have appeared on GC Capital Ideas discussing trends around capital models.

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* Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the United States through GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities Corp., a U.S. registered broker-dealer and member FINRA/SIPC. Main Office: 1166 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036. Phone: (212) 345-5000. Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the European Union by GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd., which is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Reinsurance products are placed through qualified affiliates of Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC. MMC Securities Corp., MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd. and Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC are affiliates owned by Marsh & McLennan Companies. This communication is not intended as an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security, financial instrument, reinsurance or insurance product. The securities mentioned herein have not been, and will not be, registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Act”), and may not be offered or sold in the United States except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act. **GC Analytics is a registered mark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

1. Global Unrest and Political Instability Prompts Reevaluation of Terrorism Risk and Coverage: The dramatic rise in political instability and civil unrest across the globe, including uprisings in the Middle East and protests in Greece and Spain, has triggered a significant shift in the nature of terrorism risk and has highlighted the need for tailored terrorism and political violence protection, according to a new report on global terrorism and the terror reinsurance market, “Tensions Building: the Changing Nature of Terrorism Risk and Coverage,” released by Guy Carpenter.

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2. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

Read the article >>

3. Superstorm Sandy: Initial Impacts and Implications: Guy Carpenter has published a new briefing. As documented by the National Hurricane Center, Superstorm Sandy made landfall as a post-tropical cyclone at 8PM EDT, Monday Oct 29, 2012, with maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour.

Read the article >>

4. Guy Carpenter Publishes Second Annual Insurance Risk Benchmarks Report: Guy Carpenter has published its second annual Insurance Risk Benchmarks, a resource designed to help insurers assess risk parameters and improve economic capital modeling. The report provides benchmarks for underwriting and reserve risk by line of business and by industry segment for U.S. exposures, and can be used by insurers when benchmarking their economic capital models.

Read the article >>

5. Indexation Clauses in Liability Reinsurance Treaties: A Comparison Across Europe: The Indexation Clause - otherwise referred to as the Stability Clause, Inflation Clause or Severe Inflation Clause (SIC) - is designed to maintain the real monetary value of the retention and (where applicable) the limit under a long-tail excess of loss reinsurance treaty over the duration of the claims payout pattern. The clause is only relevant to losses that are of a long-tail nature (i.e., that take a long time to become paid) and is commonly found in the terms and conditions of motor liability, general liability and professional liability third party loss excess of loss reinsurance contracts of European cedents.

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6. Recent Legislative and Judicial Developments in Continental Europe Affecting the Casualty Insurance Industry: Recent Legislative and Judicial Developments in Continental Europe Affecting the Casualty Insurance Industry is the latest installment in Guy Carpenter’s legislative update series, designed to provide our international clients and markets with a concise overview of key trends in the Continental European legal environment. These issues have had an impact on insurers and reinsurers or are expected to have an effect in the near future.

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7. Guy Carpenter Asia-Pacific Climate Impact Centre Issues Predictions of Tropical Cyclone Activity in Australian Region: Guy Carpenter Asia-Pacific Climate Impact Centre, a joint initiative of Guy Carpenter & Company and City University of Hong Kong, issued its annual predictions for the 2012/2013 tropical cyclone season for the Australian region. The final forecast is for near-normal activity (12 tropical cyclones) for the region.

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8. Periodic Payment Orders - Issues and Implications for Reinsurance: Following the passage of the Courts Act 2003, which gave courts in England and Wales the power to impose rest-of-life structured settlements, known as periodical payment orders (PPOs), to provide for the long-term care and loss of earnings of severely injured third parties, the actual incidence of such awards in the market has been relatively low. It is clear however that the trend towards PPOs has accelerated over the past year, partly driven by low interest rates. This trend presents real challenges to both insurers and reinsurers of casualty classes, particularly for motor.

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9. Thailand Flood 2011: Executive Summary: In 2011, Thailand experienced its worst flooding in years, leaving more than 800 people dead and causing severe damage across northern and central regions of the country. The floods, lasting a few months, severely damaged and disrupted manufacturing operations in Thailand.

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10. Guy Carpenter Opens New Office in DIFC, Dubai: Guy Carpenter has opened its first office in the Middle East and has received a license from the Dubai Financial Services Authority to operate as an insurance intermediary in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC).

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1. Risk Profile, Appetite and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

Read the article >>

2. Reinsurance Rates Rise at April 1, 2012 Renewals: Reinsurance rates rose as the market continues to work through the impact of the events of 2011, according to Guy Carpenter. In a briefing released today, Guy Carpenter reports that this year’s April 1 renewals are continuing the general trends observed at January 1, 2012.

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3. Terrorism: Global Terror Attacks and Hotspots: The increasingly diverse and dispersed threat has seen worldwide terrorist activity rise in recent years. The number of global terrorist attacks peaked at more than 14,400 in 2006. Although there has been a slight dip in the number of attacks over the last five years, they remain at historically high levels. Attacks increased dramatically in Afghanistan and Iraq following the deployment of coalition combat troops. Several other countries have also witnessed a big jump in terrorist activity recently, including Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

Read the article >>

4. Guy Carpenter’s January 2012, Reinsurance Renewal Report: Executive Summary: The (re)insurance sector experienced historic catastrophe losses in 2011, many in areas not previously considered ‘peak’ risks. Devastating earthquakes in Japan and New Zealand, floods in Thailand and Australia and a record-breaking tornado season in the United States contributed to insured losses in excess of USD100 billion. As carriers continue to penetrate new growth regions, ‘cold spot’ losses are expected to increase.

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5. Indexation Clauses in Liability Reinsurance Treaties: A Comparison Across Europe: The Indexation Clause - otherwise referred to as the Stability Clause, Inflation Clause or Severe Inflation Clause - is designed to maintain the real monetary value of the retention and (where applicable) the limit under a long-tail excess of loss reinsurance treaty over the duration of the claims payout pattern. The clause is only relevant to losses that are of a long-tail nature (i.e., that take a long time to become paid) and is commonly found in the terms and conditions of motor liability, general liability and professional liability third party liability excess of loss reinsurance contracts of European cedents.

Read the article >>

6. Periodic Payment Orders - Issues and Implications for Reinsurance: Following the passage of the Courts Act 2003, which gave courts in England and Wales the power to impose rest-of-life structured settlements, known as periodical payment orders (PPOs) to provide for the long-term care and loss of earnings of severely injured third parties, the actual incidence of such awards in the market has been relatively low. It is clear however that the trend towards PPOs has accelerated over the past year, partly driven by low interest rates. This trend presents real challenges to both insurers and reinsurers of casualty classes, particularly for motor.

Read the article >>

7. January 1, 2012, Renewals Reveal Shift in Industry Behavior: The January 1, 2012, renewals saw a shift in industry behavior as both insurers and reinsurers implemented more sophisticated, customized approaches to risk assessment and mitigation, according to Guy Carpenter. In its 2012 global reinsurance outlook, Catastrophes, Cold Spots and Capital: Navigating for Success in a Transitioning Market, Guy Carpenter reported that reinsurers were in a position to undertake a major review of pricing and underwriting going into the renewal season. This led to significant market fragmentation and increased market volatility at January 1.

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8. Alternative Risk Transfer: Alternative risk solutions are used to address the following client motivations: rating agency issues, adverse development, earnings stability, reserve and premium leverage issues, reinsurance recoverables, terrorism risk, capital optimization constraints, mergers and acquisitions, discontinued lines of business, provide coverage for gaps in traditional placements and optimizing costs. The structured risk team designs customized solutions to achieve a particular client’s goals. An optimal reinsurance structure is determined by capacity needs, risk tolerances, capital management, cost of risk and degree of confidence in results. A cedent will need to balance the cost of transferring sources of risk with not only its own capital management strategies but also capital requirements imposed by rating agencies.

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9. Calling All General Insurance Reserving Actuaries: Does the Bootstrap Model “Work”? Guy Carpenter’s extensive back-testing of reserve distributions created using the popular paid chain ladder bootstrap method has shown that these distributions materially under-estimate reserve risk.

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10. Superstorm Sandy: Initial Impacts and Implications: Guy Carpenter published a new briefing. As documented by the National Hurricane Center, Superstorm Sandy made landfall as a post-tropical cyclone at 8PM EDT, Monday Oct 29, 2012, with maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour.

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1. Superstorm Sandy: Initial Impacts and Implications: Guy Carpenter has published a new briefing: Superstorm Sandy: Initial Impacts and Implications. As documented by the National Hurricane Center, Superstorm Sandy made landfall as a post-tropical cyclone at 8PM EDT, Monday Oct 29, 2012, with maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour.

Read the article >>

2. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

Read the article >>

3. Update: Sandy: As always, our immediate thoughts and concerns are with those directly affected by Sandy, both in North America, and across the Caribbean. Many areas along the East Coast, and the Caribbean, bear signs of unspeakable consequences from this historic storm. The death toll in North America is now at least 55 (including one in Canada), in addition to the 67 who died in the Caribbean last week.

Read the article >>

4. Global Perils: As Table 1 shows, the three perils of wind, earthquake and flood have caused the heaviest losses to (re)insurers. While hurricanes in the United States have unsurprisingly generated the biggest wind losses, the most expensive earthquakes and floods have a more international flavor. Indeed, the most expensive earthquake loss and flood loss on record occurred last year in Japan and Thailand, respectively. Moreover, both the Tohoku earthquake/tsunami and the Thai floods revealed risks that (re)insurers had not previously considered, with contingent business interruption claims - resulting from supply chain failure - accounting for a large share of insured losses. High impact, low frequency events (such as earthquakes and tropical cyclones) and perils that typically are more regular (such as floods) are widespread in several developing markets, raising the prospect of more hidden loss potential.

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5. Guy Carpenter Publishes Second Annual Insurance Risk Benchmarks Report: Guy Carpenter has published its second annual Insurance Risk Benchmarks, a resource designed to help insurers assess risk parameters and improve economic capital modeling. The report provides benchmarks for underwriting and reserve risk by line of business and by industry segment for U.S. exposures, and can be used by insurers when benchmarking their economic capital models.

Read the article >>

6. Thailand Flood 2011: Executive Summary: In 2011, Thailand experienced its worst flooding in years, leaving more than 800 people dead and causing severe damage across northern and central regions of the country. The floods, lasting a few months, severely damaged and disrupted manufacturing operations in Thailand. Flooding also forced seven huge industrial estates in central regions to close, causing damage to the industrial sector in the billions of U.S. dollars. It is interesting to note that prior to 2011, none of the industrial parks in Thailand had been flooded over the past 40 years. During the last major flood in 1995, the dykes in the industrial parks kept floodwaters out.

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7. Guy Carpenter Asia Pacific Catastrophe Report 2012; Executive Summary: At the time we were publishing our 2011 Asia Pacific Catastrophe report there was a growing realization that losses from the Thai flooding at the time were going to be significant. The Thai flood losses came at the end of a run of losses in the Asia Pacific region that were large, unprecedented in recent times and possibly unexpected by many market participants.

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8. Terrorism: Global Terror Attacks and Hotspots: The increasingly diverse and dispersed threat has seen worldwide terrorist activity rise in recent years. The number of global terrorist attacks peaked at more than 14,400 in 2006 (see Figure 1). Although there has been a slight dip in the number of attacks over the last five years, they remain at historically high levels. Attacks increased dramatically in Afghanistan and Iraq following the deployment of coalition combat troops. Several other countries have also witnessed a big jump in terrorist activity recently, including Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

Read the article >>

9. Indexation Clauses in Liability Reinsurance Treaties: A Comparison Across Europe: The Indexation Clause - otherwise referred to as the Stability Clause, Inflation Clause, or Severe Inflation Clause (SIC) - is designed to maintain the real monetary value of the retention and (where applicable) the limit under a long-tail excess of loss (XL) reinsurance treaty over the duration of the claims payout pattern. The clause is only relevant to losses that are of a long-tail nature (i.e., that take a long time to become paid) and is commonly found in the terms and conditions of Motor Liability (MTPL), General Liability (GTPL), and Professional Liability TPL XL reinsurance contracts of European cedents.

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10. Floods in Italy and France: Torrential rainfall across northern and central Italy and southeastern France has triggered widespread flooding, killing at least 11 people and causing damage to property and infrastructure. Reports said the heavy rainfall caused rivers to burst their banks and forced thousands of people to evacuate their homes. The Italian city of Genoa was badly hit on November 4 after more than 350 millimeters of rain fell in six hours. Authorities in Italy have issued fresh flood alerts and are warning thousands more people will be at risk if the flooding continues.

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1. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

Read the article >>

2. Comparing Solvency II Standard Scenarios for Windstorms with Catastrophe Model Outcomes - Updated Study: With the generalized use of catastrophe models to measure the natural catastrophe exposure of insurance portfolios, the outcomes of these models have more and more influence in the determination of reinsurance needs. With the introduction of the Solvency II regime, the decision on reinsurance purchase should also be an integral part of a company’s risk management process. Specifically, an important consideration is the impact of reinsurance contracts on the Solvency Capital Ratio, a key decision metric of the risk management process. This process is not always easy when the probable maximum losses (PMLs) derived by the cat models differ from the standard European scenarios under Solvency II for calculation of the Solvency Capital Requirement for cat risk (SCRCat).

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3. What is the Reserving Cycle? Reserve releases have helped support financial results in the face of significant catastrophe losses in recent years. There are nevertheless indications that reserve redundancies will soon run out even though the sector continued to benefit from reserve releases on a calendar year basis in 2011. Figure 1 shows how calendar year redundancies have been a feature of earnings for a composite of 26 large U.S. P&C carriers since 1995.

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4. Update: Sandy: As always, our immediate thoughts and concerns are with those directly affected by Sandy, both in North America, and across the Caribbean. Many areas along the East Coast, and the Caribbean, bear signs of unspeakable consequences from this historic storm. The death toll in North America is now at least 55 (including one in Canada), in addition to the 67 who died in the Caribbean last week.

Read the article >>

5. Thailand Flood 2011: Executive Summary: In 2011, Thailand experienced its worst flooding in years, leaving more than 800 people dead and causing severe damage across northern and central regions of the country. The floods, lasting a few months, severely damaged and disrupted manufacturing operations in Thailand. Flooding also forced seven huge industrial estates in central regions to close, causing damage to the industrial sector in the billions of U.S. dollars. It is interesting to note that prior to 2011, none of the industrial parks in Thailand had been flooded over the past 40 years.

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6. Risk Preference Function - Embedding Risk-Reward in Capital Allocation: Capital allocation decisions are among the most important decisions made by company management. Through our own research and thought leadership and our observance of best practices at clients around the world, Guy Carpenter’s Enterprise Risk Management Advisory practice has compiled a set of leading practices around capital allocation for (re)insurers.

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7. Baden-Baden Reinsurance Symposium Considers the Opportunities and Threats Created by Volatility: Guy Carpenter hosted “Volatility - Opportunity or Threat?” the Reinsurance Symposium held in Baden-Baden on October 21. The event examined how volatility is viewed within the insurance and reinsurance sectors, particularly from a financial perspective, and explored the potential which market turbulence can generate.

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8. Model Suitability Analysis (MSA)SM - Own Your View of Risk: The quantification of catastrophe risk through the use of numerical models is accepted routine in our industry. Given the large impact of catastrophe risk on (re)insurance portfolios it is no surprise that the methodologies used for such quantifications are becoming the subject of more intense scrutiny by regulators and risk managers. Whether the motivation is internal, external or both, efforts are now in full swing towards acquiring a deeper understanding and a more sophisticated use of catastrophe risk model results - the path to “own your view of risk.”

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9. Capital Models - What Lies Beneath: A robust capital model can be a great tool to help run a (re)insurance business. It is a given that capital models rely on a huge wealth of assumptions, and it is the quality of these assumptions that determine how useful the model is. There is an emphasis on those assumptions that are explicit, for example, catastrophe model outputs, premium rates and reserve volatility. But there is another type of assumption - that which is implicit. These assumptions can have a very material impact on the model results.

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10. Cold Spots Heating Up: Executive Summary: The succession of costly and global catastrophe losses over the last few years has had a wide-ranging impact on the (re)insurance sector. Since 2010, (re)insurers have been hit by powerful earthquakes in Chile, New Zealand and Japan, while devastating floods also caused widespread damage in Australia and Thailand. The exceptional cluster of global natural catastrophes in 2011 in particular emphasized increasing risk in emerging markets. The result has been unexpectedly expensive ‘cold spot’ losses in areas that were not considered as risky in the past.

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1. Risk Profile, Appetite, and Tolerance: Fundamental Concepts in Risk Management and Reinsurance Effectiveness: Prior to the recent turbulence in the financial markets, insurers and reinsurers were increasing their use of enterprise risk management to make risk and capital management decisions. While this was driven in part by rating agencies and regulators, many carriers began to recognize the value of metric-based frameworks and capital models in evaluating their portfolios.

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2. July 1 Reinsurance Renewals Reveal Plentiful Capacity amid Benign Catastrophe Activity, According to Guy Carpenter: Reinsurance renewals took place against a backdrop of plentiful capacity at July 1, 2012. Capital has continued to strengthen through the second quarter of 2012, moderating pricing pressures, according to a briefing released today by Guy Carpenter & Company.

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3. Guy Carpenter Explores Opportunities in a Challenging Market At Monte Carlo Rendez-Vous 2012: In its fifth annual press briefing held at the Reinsurance Rendez-Vous 2012 in Monte Carlo, Guy Carpenter addressed the challenging market conditions currently facing the re/insurance industry and highlighted opportunities for growth.

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4. Chart: U.S. Property Catastrophe Rate on Line Index: Based on early calculations at July 1, overall property catastrophe pricing for 2012 as compared to 2011 was up 6.5 percent.

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5. Standard & Poor’s Proposed Insurance Rating Criteria Update: On July 9, 2012, Standard & Poor’s (S&P) issued a Request for Comment on proposed changes to its criteria for rating insurance companies globally. Although S&P expects the overall impact on global ratings to be modest, the proposed changes are significant and may adversely affect individual rated (re)insurers. The new criteria are expected to be published in late 2012 or early 2013.

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6. Indexation Clauses in Liability Reinsurance Treaties: A Comparison Across Europe: The Indexation Clause - otherwise referred to as the Stability Clause, Inflation Clause, or Severe Inflation Clause (SIC) - is designed to maintain the real monetary value of the retention and (where applicable) the limit under a long-tail excess of loss (XL) reinsurance treaty over the duration of the claims payout pattern. The clause is only relevant to losses that are of a long-tail nature (i.e., that take a long time to become paid) and is commonly found in the terms and conditions of motor liability (MTPL), general liability (GTPL), and professional liability TPL XL reinsurance contracts of European cedents.

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7. Guy Carpenter Details Top Risks for (Re)insurance Industry in Mid-Year Market Report: Guy Carpenter released its mid-year market report, which addresses the top risks (re)insurers face as they seek profitable growth. The report, Overcoming Key Risks on the Road to Profitable Growth, provides a detailed analysis of three key risks to the sector: economic uncertainty and emerging interest rate sensitivity, the shifting nature of catastrophe losses and reserving risk.

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8. Catastrophe Bonds* at July 1, 2012: Catastrophe bonds continue to play an increasingly important role in the property catastrophe risk transfer market with particularly robust issuance levels. During the first six months of 2012, 15 transactions came to market, totaling USD3.4 billion of risk principal. In terms of risk principal, this is a 113 percent increase relative to the first half of 2011. Risk principal outstanding now stands at USD13.5 billion, within striking distance of the high water mark of USD14 billion established in 2007 after the post-Katrina-Rita-Wilma issuance surge.

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9. “Cold Spot” Catastrophe Losses Reveal Potential Emerging Market Risks, According to Guy Carpenter Report: Guy Carpenter published a new report that offers insight into catastrophe risks in developing economies and how they are likely to affect the (re)insurance sector as companies target growth opportunities in these new markets, including emerging Asia and Latin America.

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10. Reinsurance Renewal Review: 2012: Here we review GC Capital Ideas’ stories covering the key reinsurance renewals in 2012.

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* Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the United States through GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities Corp., a U.S. registered broker-dealer and member FINRA/SIPC. Main Office: 1166 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10036. Phone: (212) 345-5000. Securities or investments, as applicable, are offered in the European Union by GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd., which is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Reinsurance products are placed through qualified affiliates of Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC. MMC Securities Corp., MMC Securities (Europe) Ltd. and Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC are affiliates owned by Marsh & McLennan Companies. This communication is not intended as an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security, financial instrument, reinsurance or insurance product. The securities mentioned herein have not been, and will not be, registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “Securities Act”), and may not be offered or sold in the United States except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act. **GC Analytics is a registered mark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.