As rating agencies recently affirmed their negative outlook on commercial lines due in part to soft-market pricing, a new Towers Watson survey shows that rates have been flattening for nine months.
In a recent report, Moody's Investors Service says, "The combination of continued price declines, stable-to-rising losses and a limited ability to support earnings through reserve releases suggests that the commercial-lines market will remain highly challenging for the remainder of 2011."
And at Standard & Poor's 2011 Insurance Conference earlier this month, Neil Stein, director and property and casualty-sector specialist at S&P, said commercial lines are challenged by "a plethora of factors," including price declines, competition, lower demand and reduced investment income. He called price declines the biggest risk factor for primary P&C companies.
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