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News Desk

There are times when we search fruitlessly for a news piece to inspire a blog post good enough for you readers. And then there are the rare times when we log on to various news sites and are inundated with headlines relating to this industry. Today is one of those days.

  • It looks like Munich Re has gotten itself into some hot water over a raunchy party hosted by Munich Re-owned Ergo Insurance. Though the party was held back in 2007, the reinsurance giant is still feeling the reputational sting (and likely will for a long time to come) over a party that rewarded top salesmen with prostitutes. The management in charge of organizing that event are no longer employed at Ergo.
  • There were about 100 guests and 20 prostitutes were hired. A German business newspaper said the prostitutes had worn colour-coded arm-bands designating their availability, and the women had their arms stamped after each service rendered.

  • On the completely opposite side of the spectrum, it was announced today that executives at Lloyds Banking Group will be handing back bonuses. This is due to the ₤3.2 billion hit the bank took for “mis-selling payment protection insurance.”
  • In the world of insurance rates, Hardy Underwriting Bermuda Ltd. reports that insurance and reinsurance that renewed during the first quarter of the year saw “average rate increases of 1.5%.”
  • This morning, I stumbled across this management blog, which proves to be quite the resource for managers in any industry, listing the 50 people to follow on Twitter that will provide you with a windfall of information to help you succeed.

The Top 25 Property/Casualty Insurance Writers

No, neither Johnathan Franzen nor myself made the list. We’re talking about the companies that wrote the most business in 2010. Here’s the full list of the top 25 U.S. carriers in terms of net premiums written, according to AM Best.

1. State Farm Group—$50,808,635
2. Allstate Insurance Group—$24,796,656
3. Liberty Mutual Insurance Cos.—$21,483,996
4. Berkshire Hathaway Insurance—$21,358,316
5. Travelers Group—$20,594,458
6. American International Group—$19,687,720
7. Nationwide Group—$14,489,531
8. Progressive Insurance Group—$14,476,676
9. Farmers Insurance Group—$14,129,512
10. USAA Group—$10,679,414
11. Hartford Insurance Group—$9,688,760
12. Chubb Group of Insurance Cos.—$8,927,736
13. CNA Insurance Cos.—$6,188,618
14. American Family Insurance Group—$5,324,290
15. Allianz of America—$4,666,301
16. Auto-Owners Insurance Group—$4,485,442
17. Munich-America Holding Corp.—$4,413,834
18. Zurich Financial Services NA Group—$4,400,123
19. Erie Insurance Group—$4,019,273
20. Ace INA Group—$3,705,475
21. Transatlantic Holdings Inc. Group—$3,418,020
22. W.R. Berkley Group—$3,392,330
23. The Hanover Insurance Group Property & Casualty Cos.—$3,053,508
24. MetLife Auto & Home Group—$2,983,236
25. Cincinnati Insurance Cos.—$2,965,462

Australian Disasters: The Reinsurers Hit Hardest

Beginning December 2010, a series of floods devastated the Australian state of Queensland, three-quarters of which was declared a disaster zone. The latest reports claim the floods killed 35, affected at least 70 towns and cost insurers more than $2 billion, with Cyclone Yasi possibly costing another $500 to $800 million, according to the Insurance Council of Australia.

Karl Sullivan, the council’s general manager of risk and disaster has said insurance companies have received 73,000 claims for the Queensland floods and Cyclone Yasi combined. The following is a list of the insurers most affected by Australian catastrophes (estimates):

Munich Re: The reinsurer was hit hardest with claims totaling $365 million. The company’s fourth quarter profit declined 38% due to the Australian floods plus other costly losses. Munich Re was hit in 2010 by the Chile earthquake (claims of $1 billion) and also affected by September’s earthquake in New Zealand (claims of $460 million).

Chief Financial Officer Joerg Schneider said that “despite weighty major losses, which also affected us at the end of the year, we are presenting a good result.”

Partner Re: The Pembroke, Bermuda-based company announced yesterday that they expect losses of between $80 and $100 million due to the floods and storms that hit Australia. Furthermore, it has stated that its 2010 profits have been dented due to the back-to-back natural disasters.

XL Group: The company has seen first quarter losses of $75 to $95 million related to Australian floods. The company, however, beat Wall Street expectations for quarterly operating profit, due mostly to higher premiums from its property/casualty segment.

Hanover Re: The reinsurer, the world’s third largest, is expecting losses of $56 to $100 million from Australia’s natural disasters. The company is optimistic after negotiating better-than-expected renewal rates, however.

“For 2011 we see sufficient opportunities for selective profitable growth,” Ulrich Wallin, chief executive officer of the Hanover, Germany-based reinsurer, told reporters during a briefing at the company’s headquarters. “We shall concentrate on segments where prices are rising or where they adequately reflect the risks.”

Transatlantic Holdings: The company expects catastrophe losses to come in between $50 million and $100 million due to the Australian weather events. Like others, the company remains optimistic about future earnings growth.

“We achieved strong earnings for the quarter and year despite an elevated level of industry catastrophe loss activity. Book value per share increased 13% in the last twelve months and 43% since the end of 2008. Net operating cash inflows totaled $1.1 billion in 2010,” said Robert F. Orlich, President and Chief Executive Officer.

Do Insurers Pose Systemic Risk?

The G20 is meeting today and tomorrow and among the items of its agenda is finalizing the new, stricter capital requirements that Basel III will mandate for banks.

And also insurers?

Perhaps, according to a new report from Bloomberg.

The Financial Stability Board and the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision are considering including insurers and clearing houses in measures to safeguard the world economy from crises at so-called systemically important financial institutions, said the people, who declined to be identified because the talks are private … “Systemic relevance does not depend on an insurer’s size, but on the nature of the business,” Allianz SE Chief Financial Officer Oliver Baete said in a conference call yesterday.

“Defining systemic relevance by size is wrong. I would always be watching for weak business models as those could become systemically relevant faster than we all can imagine.”

Obviously, many insurers disagree.

“We firmly believe that insurers, if they keep to their core business, are not systemically relevant as banks are, and we are very confident that politicians will clearly see that difference,” Joerg Schneider, chief financial officer at Munich Re, the world’s biggest reinsurer, said in a conference call Nov. 9. “We regard ourselves as not systemically relevant and we are quite convinced that this is economically sound.”

What do you think?