Chart: Top Ten Significant Insured Loss Events: 2017
The table lists the latest estimates for the top ten significant insured loss events for 2017.
The table lists the latest estimates for the top ten significant insured loss events for 2017.
Guy Carpenter has released an estimate of year-end reinsurance capital levels and results of the January 2018 reinsurance renewal.
According to the analysis, capital dedicated to reinsurance continued to grow in 2017 despite catastrophe losses. Due to ongoing excess supply and overall market resilience at January 1, rate firming was generally moderate and pricing shifts focused on client-specific justification.
Here is a look back at the CAT-i stories covering October through December of 2017.
Here we review recent GC Capital Ideas posts on Guy Carpenter’s efforts to address the flood peril.
Jonathan Hayes, Managing Director and John Kulik, Senior Vice President
The factors that contribute to the gap between economic and insured losses.
Insured losses in Australia and New Zealand were the largest events. The region was also impacted by floods in China, India and Thailand and an earthquake in China. Once again, flood was a major contributor to economic losses in the region, but often in areas where insurance penetration was limited. Flood is difficult for (re)insurers to model, but Guy Carpenter has made significant steps to help clients deal with the problems.
A year marked by generally benign loss experience and few large catastrophe events meant that rates continued to remain positive for buyers in the Asia Pacific region throughout 2017. At the same time, the trend for steady growth in limit purchased continued. Much of the new limit purchased tends to be at the top of programs, and this feeds through to lower overall average rates on line (ROL), which is also reflected in the indices.
Wildfire activity has rendered especially severe impacts to certain areas of California since October 8, including areas of Napa, Sonoma and Solano Counties. Wildfire activity has also rendered impacts to areas of Orange County east of the Los Angeles Metro area. Rates of extreme fire spread were enabled by especially dry conditions together with offshore gusty winds to burn a total of at least 217,566 acres since October 8. Media reports indicate at least 41 fatalities, making this the deadliest series of fires in California history. At least 5,700 structures have been destroyed and thousands more remain under threat. Containment efforts have made significant progress in the last week, thanks to efforts of at least 10,000 firefighters and reduced winds. Cooler conditions with an increase in moisture are expected this week with a chance for some precipitation over Northern California, according to the U.S. National Weather Service (NWS); this should support containment efforts. It will take some time to fully ascertain the full scope and severity of this event, and our first thoughts and concerns are with those lost and directly affected.