E&S/Specialty

We have a higher cost of capital because we're in a volatile class," he said, referring to the heavy weighting of the company's business in catastrophe lines.

More than $17 billion of capital washed up on the Bermuda shores in 2009, as underwriting profits and investment recoveries for a group of insurers and reinsurers erased a $10 billion capital drop for 2008.

One of the featured speakers at the NAPSLO Mid-Year Leadership Forum was familiar to many members attending the Friday morning session, but according to Tony Markel, the company he led for decades looks entirely different in 2010.

Strategic Risk Solutions (SRS) said it is expanding into Hawaii with the hiring of Judy Nako, former acting deputy commissioner and captive insurance administrator for the state.

Crop insurance carriers and independent agents say the U.S. Agriculture Department's latest proposed cuts in subsidies in the program as well as a "soft cap" on agents' commissions are both unwarranted and hurtful.

Legislation repealing the antitrust exemption afforded health insurers through the McCarran-Ferguson Act, but keeping the shield intact for medical malpractice carriers, was approved overwhelmingly last week by the U.S. House of Representatives.