With an eye out for potential windstorms and concerns over fallout from the subprime market meltdown, an earthquake in China and the recent tragic plane crash in Spain, global reinsurers are balancing multiple catastrophic exposures while striving to maintain underwriting discipline in a softening market, industry observers say.

"I think the reinsurance community at the moment is reasonably healthy and aligned, and that isn't always the case," said W. Marston Becker, chairman and chief executive officer of Max Capital Group Ltd., in Hamilton, Bermuda. "I think that is good news for the industry in the aggregate, and hopefully it maintains itself for awhile."

Mr. Becker observed that the reinsurance markets globally have stayed more disciplined from a pricing perspective than have the underlying primary insurance markets. "Part of this is the tremendous focus that the rating agencies, the investor world and the reinsurers have today on [return on equity], so they're much more return-oriented in their pricing of these transactions," he explained.

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