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International

Major insurer dumps Texas home insurance market

01 October 2002

Farmers Insurance, one of the largest US general insurers, has moved out of the Texas homeowners’ insurance market, citing a $2.3 billion loss in the state over the past two years…

US counts the cost of crashes

01 October 2002

For those vehicle insurers lamenting their lot in the Australian market, vehicle crashes in the year 2000 cost the US more than $421 billion…

Scor drops Gerling

24 September 2002

French reinsurer Scor Re has stepped away from negotiations to buy Gerling Re’s life business and some non-life reinsurance operations…

Insurers pull out of China

24 September 2002

More than 20 foreign insurance companies which entered the China insurance market after the World Trade Organisation agreement was ratified are now pulling out…

Ireland bans contingency fee advertising

24 September 2002

Now it’s the Irish Government joining the attack on the compensation culture. It has announced new regulation banning lawyers from advertising for compensation business…

Brokers in UK warned

24 September 2002

Just a note for brokers and agents feeling a little harassed by all the compliance pressure…

Lloyd’s market votes for reform

17 September 2002

Lloyd’s of London has voted in favour of reforming its 314-year-old insurance business – but the victory could still be overturned by the Names…

Zurich does a drastic rethink

10 September 2002

It’s all bad news at Zurich, with the big Swiss financial services company announcing a $3.6 billion loss for the first half of 2002, compared with a profit of $1.5 billion…

Names say no as Lloyd’s vote looms

10 September 2002

The Lloyd’s reforms could be in trouble, with the largest voting bloc turning against the bold program set up by Lloyd’s Chairman Sax Riley…

UK insurers call for workers’ comp reform

10 September 2002

Workers’ compensation is under the microscope in Britain as the Association of British Insurers begins a campaign for fundamental long-term reform…

Scor makes a bid for Gerling Re

10 September 2002

French reinsurer Scor is holding discussions with Gerling on acquiring some of the German insurer’s reinsurance operations…

Axa follows the others down

10 September 2002

French insurer Axa has followed the international trend with a lower first-half profit well down on last year’s figures…

Europeans take a dive, too

03 September 2002

Insurers and some reinsurers globally are seeing their profits eroding rapidly as the downturn in equity markets bites harder than increasing premiums can offset…

Munich Re shows how it’s done

03 September 2002

Amid the gloom and doom comes a stand-out result from Munich Re, which ended the first half with a net income of $7.5 billion, up on the $2.3 billion recorded…

Gerling Re gets out of the US

03 September 2002

Gerling has bitten the bullet on its disastrous reinsurance foray into the US market and put its US operation into run-off…

WTC decision closer

27 August 2002

World Trade Centre leaseholder Larry Silverstein has been told that under no circumstances can he claim up $6.4 billion from Swiss Re…