Risk & Insurance articles from January 2002

Risk & Insurance archives from January 2002

A New Symphony of Risk. (Top 50).
January 1, 2002... Risk managers at the top 50 companies find themselves facing new twists to old risks. Hardening markets, insurer/reinsurer solvency, changes to property insurance contracts, and management of total risk costs over time are some of their biggest...

Tough times ahead: Cost of risk could double in 2002. (Up Front).
January 1, 2002... The cost of risk declined in 2000 from $5.20 per $1,000 of revenue in 1999 to $4.83 per $1,000 of revenue, its lowest mark in over a decade, reports the Risk and Insurance Management Society Inc., New York, in its 2001 RIMS Benchmark Survey....

Industry Eye: Focus on the Big Boys. (Up Front).
January 1, 2002... As big businesses regroup amid a pinched economy in a post-September 11 world, the emergence of a new risk management player, RM Access, might seem tailor-made for brokering big solutions. A company spun from the Boston-based mega-financial...

Asbestos Losses to Increase. (Up Front).
January 1, 2002... The property/casualty insurance industry will suffer more than $121 billion in net asbestos and environmental losses, according to a special report issued by the A.M. Best Co., Oldwick, N.J., titled "Final Data Support A.M. Best's Projection of...

From the Editor.
January 1, 2002... This new year begins, as do most new years, on a note of hope for the future. Yet it's hard to recall any annual turn of the calendar so heavily shadowed by the events of previous months. If 2001 was defined by the catastrophe and repercussion...

Managed care losing favor? (Up Front).
January 1, 2002... States have passed much fewer medical cost-containment laws and regulations for workers' compensation since 1997 and are instead evaluating those already in place, finds the Workers Compensation Research Institute, Cambridge, Mass., in its...

Chicago-based CNA Financial Corp. will eliminate 1,850 jobs, 10 percent of its work force, as part of a restructuring. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... Chicago-based CNA Financial Corp. will eliminate 1,850 jobs, 10 percent of its work force, as part of a restructuring. The company is discontinuing its variable life and annuity business, and consolidating real estate location. Company...

American International Group Inc., New York, The Chubb Corp., Warren, N.J., and GS Capital Partners 2000, an investment fund managed by Goldman Sachs & Co., New York. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... American International Group Inc., New York, The Chubb Corp., Warren, N.J., and GS Capital Partners 2000, an investment fund managed by Goldman Sachs & Co., New York, have teamed up to form Allied World Assurance Holdings Ltd. and its...

Marsh Inc., New York, and VERSAR Inc., a Springfield, Va.-based provider of counter-terrorism, environmental, and related services. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... Marsh Inc., New York, and VERSAR Inc., a Springfield, Va.-based provider of counter-terrorism, environmental, and related services, have agreed to combine forces to provide chemical and bioterrorism risk assessment services.

The Aon Corp., Chicago, has formed Endurance Specialty Insurance Ltd., a Bermuda-based property and casualty underwriting unit formed to provide additional capacity. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... The Aon Corp., Chicago, has formed Endurance Specialty Insurance Ltd., a Bermuda-based property and casualty underwriting unit formed to provide additional capacity in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks. Endurance will have a total...

White Mountains Insurance Group Ltd. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... White Mountains Insurance Group Ltd., in White River Junction, Vt., will set up a reinsurance firm. The new company, unnamed as of yet, will be capitalized with at least $1 billion, with White Mountains supplying $200 million.

Chubb Specialty Insurance, part of the Chubb Group of Insurance Cos., Warren, N.J., has consolidated three of its product groups. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... Chubb Specialty Insurance, part of the Chubb Group of Insurance Cos., Warren, N.J., has consolidated three of its product groups--professional liability, media/intellectual property, and mergers & acquisitions--into one business unit called...

ING Canada and Zurich North America Canada. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... ING Canada and Zurich North America Canada, both of Toronto, Ontario, have formed a strategic alliance in which the two companies will leverage their expertise in the commercial and corporate lines of insurance, with Zurich renewing the large...

XL Capital Ltd., Bermuda, has formed a strategic partnership with FrontPoint Partners LLC, a Greenwich, Conn.-based alternative investment management company. (News and Notes).
January 1, 2002... XL Capital Ltd., Bermuda, has formed a strategic partnership with FrontPoint Partners LLC, a Greenwich, Conn.-based alternative investment management company, in which XL Capital will invest $500 million in FrontPoint investment strategies as...

Internet Security Breaches. (Tech Briefs).
January 1, 2002... The number of Internet security breaches reported in 2001 more than doubled the total from 2000 (40,000 from 20,000), reports The CERT Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. The group expects the numbers to increase...

Free Captive Feasibility Tool. (Tech Briefs).
January 1, 2002... Munich-American Risk Partners, a subsidiary of American Re, and The Becher + Carlson Cos., both of Princeton, N.J., have introduced Captive Explorer, a free Internet-based tool to help risk managers investigate the captive option. Using the...

Privacy Web site. (Tech Briefs).
January 1, 2002... The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), Kansas City, Mo., has introduced a new privacy page to its Web site so that interested parties can learn about state legislation concerning consumer privacy. By accessing the page at...

RM Software Vendor Report. (Tech Briefs).
January 1, 2002... Risk management software vendors need their products to meet the unique needs of buyers if they are to succeed, according to a report from Meridien Research, Newton, Mass. In particular, vendors need to widen the scope of their target markets...

Instant Messaging: An Unchecked Security Exposure. (Technology Solutions).
January 1, 2002... You've cleared up the security holes created by your Web site. You've put firewalls around your network. You've even managed to close the door on e-mail exposure. Yet you didn't think about that employee who chats with customers via instant...

Online Spy.
January 1, 2002... Welcome to the inaugural Online Spy column. In this space, you will find risk management and insurance news and analysis that Risk & Insurance editors discover while rummaging through the Web. Recently, we spied an article on the...

AIRProfiler. (Insurance Online).
January 1, 2002... Applied Insurance Research, a Boston-based catastrophe modeling company, has released. AIRProfiler, a Web-based application designed to provide underwriters, risk managers, real estate agents and individual property owners with...

Commercial Business Intelligence and Total Compliance Group. (Insurance Online).
January 1, 2002... Commercial Business Intelligence and Total Compliance Group, both of Ventura, Calif., have teamed up to offer companies an easier way of searching for companies, persons, governments, organizations, and groups whose activities violate the laws...

Security Arrangements. (Workers' Comp).
January 1, 2002... To ensure the payment of workers' compensation benefits to injured workers and/or their dependents, state legislatures have enacted provisions detailing how coverage is to be secured. These laws generally require employers to satisfy their...

Broader not always better. (Property).
January 1, 2002... Larry Silverstein expects a lot from his insurers. The company he founded, Silverstein Properties, owned 7 World Trade Center and leased the other five office buildings in the complex for 99 years beginning last July. Now he expects the...

The Insurance Industry reacts. (Risk Primer).
January 1, 2002... September 11, 2001, will forever be remembered for its tragic and unimaginable loss of human life and for its impact on life as we know it in the United States. The impact on the insurance industry will continue for the foreseeable future. One...

Calendar of upcoming events.
January 1, 2002... January 24 2001 Insurance Leader of the Year Annual Award Dinner. This benefit evening, hosted annually by The School of Risk Management, Insurance, and Actuarial Science (SRM) of St. John's University (formerly The College of Insurance),...

The Internet and Fraud. (E-Commerce).
January 1, 2002... Despite the economic woes of 2001, e-commerce continued to grow at record rates, say Internet marketing experts. But while the growth generated business opportunities, it also created a new generation of enterprise risk management problems. ...

The Flight to Quality. (Bermuda Angle).
January 1, 2002... October was the best of times and the worst of times in the Bermuda insurance market, which is experiencing intense activity in the wake of the events of September 11. Ace and XL announced third-quarter net losses of $442.6 million and...

The New Big Picture. (Risk in Focus).
January 1, 2002... The effects of September 11 parallel those of natural catastrophes, but unlike natural catastrophes, the risk of terrorism has virtually no predictability. Insurers and reinsurers are left to wrestle with pricing and capacity issues for which...

Held Hostage by Fear. (Risk in Focus).
January 1, 2002... In a world made uncertain by terrorists, a chemical weapon or bioterrorism threat--and even a hoax--can shut down a business for days and create an unique new type of environmental liability, as well as lead to workplace safety issues and other...

New ideas in pharmacy cost control. (Benefits).
January 1, 2002... Rising pharmacy costs have sparked interest in different ways to manage this benefit. A new method--called reference pricing--can help companies pave the way for a three-tier pharmacy benefit plan. Spurred on by an aging population,...

A new reality for Workers' Comp: The Tenth Annual Workers' Compensation and Disability Conference addressed the impact of terrorism on workers' comp and looked ahead to the future. (Meetings).
January 1, 2002... Now more than ever, workers' compensation and disability managers face challenges that are less predictable. In a post-September 11 world, uncertainty reigns. But one thing is certain: workers' comp premiums are expected to continue their climb...

Baden-Baden 2001: Loss and Luxury. (Insurance Executive).
January 1, 2002... In the second of a two-part report on the recent reinsurer meetings in Baden-Baden, our EU correspondent finds that attendees view high reinsurer ratings as something of a luxury in the post-September 11 climate-- while a tight retrocessional...

Technology's New Economics. (Insurance Executive).
January 1, 2002... Concern about privacy, lower investment income and high claims from September 11, as well as the resulting greater emphasis on cost-efficiency, all mean a new business priority for insurers. Technology projects will now have to address the...

Getting the most from your TPA. (Claims Management & TPAs).
January 1, 2002... As corporate America sees its bottom line shrinking, risk managers are looking to every line item for ways to stay in the black. Getting the most out of a TPA is just one way to make sure company dollars are spent wisely. In a time fraught...

Overcoming Hurdles in a changing D&O market: A hardening market on the underwriting side of the business should not be grounds for an insurer to change its approach to managing claims. (Claims Management & TPAs).
January 1, 2002... For the past six or seven years it has been a buyers' market for directors' and officers' insurance. Generous limits, liberal terms and conditions, and low premium rates have been pretty much the norm. Many D&O insurers were seduced into...

Better Litigation Management: A collaborative approach with attorneys can lead to better outcomes in managing litigated claims. (Claims Management & TPAs).
January 1, 2002... Improving bottom line financial results has become a daunting task for insurers in this sluggish economy. Confronted by stagnant premiums and diminishing profit ratios, industry managers face overwhelming financial pressures. Consider the...