State of the P&C insurance market in Q3 2020
Burns & Wilcox notes the insurance market continued to harden while capacity remained tight but not scare as carriers deployed resources more strategically.
The U.S. property & casualty (P&C) market continued building on the momentum from the first half of the year into the third quarter, according to Burns & Wilcox, Ltd., which reported insurers and reinsurers remain committed to underwriting profitability through close management of rates, terms, conditions and spread of risk.
While the market is trending up, incoming quarterly earnings reports are showing mixed signs, according to Burns & Wilcox, with some margins seen significant declines, while others met or exceeded estimates. The differing results were primarily due to COVID-19 losses, as some carriers took reserves earlier in the year while others maintained a wait-and-see approach. An extremely active hurricane season, which saw more named storms coming ashore than in any previous year, also had an impact on Q3 results.
Rates continue upward trajectory, capacity isn’t scarce
During the past 18-24 months hard market conditions have persisted, and the general feelings are this will continue into 2021 and perhaps even further out, according to Burns & Wilcox. Driving this further is the slew of catastrophic events seen in Q3 and ongoing uncertainty around the pandemic. Most carriers are however reporting rate increases are outpacing loss costs despite these persisting challenges.
This hard market is different from similar ones, according to Burns & Wilcox, in that capacity appears ample. The wholesale broker and underwriting company noted carriers are decreasing the amount of limit they are willing to put on any given risk, but that is being driven by ROI-based decision making and not because of a shortage.
“Generally speaking, insureds who are not securing total available global capacity on their risk should not be the least bit concerned, only those who buy ‘market available’ need be concerned,” Paul G. Smith, corporate senior vice president, carrier relations, for H.W. Kaufman Group, wrote.
Can COVID public-private insurance partnerships succeed?
The third quarter saw a number of diverging court rulings around business interruption (BI) suits, a trend that is expected to continue. This is propelling much of the talk around public-private partnerships, or government-backed pandemic backstops, which have been met with mixed reviews.
Lloyd’s CEO John Neal showed pessimism on the chances of government-backed pandemic reinsurance proposals coming to fruition, while Stefan Golling, Munich Re’s chief underwriter, has stressed a need for such programs. He explained BI losses are widespread across industries and not insurable by the private sector alone.
It should be noted that while Neal is down on the chance of public-private partnerships getting off the ground, he has said having those conversations is important.
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