Specialty Insurance Where Are We Headed?

Transcription

1 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium Specialty Insurance Where Are We Headed? David Cash Endurance Specialty New York - February 6-7, 2013

2 Keynote Outline 1. Who are the Specialty Companies? 2. Economic drivers for Specialty Insurance and Reinsurance 3. What are Specialty Companies doing to break free? 4. Making it work in practice 5. Predictions for the next 10 years

3 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium Who are the Specialty Companies? New York - February 6-7, 2013

4 Defining Specialty Insurance In the P&C industry there are two dominant strategies: Scale/ Efficiency and Specialization Personal and Standard lines companies focus on scale/efficiency Specialty Companies develop specialized underwriting expertise and an ability to serve distinctive customer segments Among specialty re-insurance companies there are two types of companies: Experts in underwriting complex risks [D&O, Cat, Engineering, Environment] Experts in serving customer segments with distinctive structural and delivery needs [Med Mal, Crop, Surety, Credit ]

5 How big is the Specialty Market? The US Specialty Insurance Market is $75 - $100 B. / Global Specialty ~ $ 150+ B.

6 Where are the Specialty Companies? Lloyds of London US Excess & Surplus Bermuda Global Reinsurers Global Insurers 80+ Syndicates 140+ Co s 27 Companies 40+ Companies 20+ Companies 2011 GWP of $30 Billion 2011 GWP of $31 Billion 2011 SH Equity of $76 Billion 2011 GWP of $175 Billion 2011 GWP of $300+ Billion Accounts for 20% of US E&S Direct Written Premiums Lloyds & Bermuda Companies account for 30% market premiums 60% of Bermuda Co s have Lloyds vehicles and 80% operate in the US Germany, Bermuda and Switzerland account for 60% of Global R/I P&C premiums National Champions from US, Europe & Asia Pacific

7 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium What are the economic drivers for Specialty Insurance Companies? New York - February 6-7, 2013

8 Change in Annual Real Net Written Premium Insurance Managing the US Underwriting Cycle The Underwriting Cycle drives specialty insurance profits 100% 75% All P&C E&S Only 50% 9 Year Cycle 17 Year Cycle 10 Years In 25% 0% -25% 8

9 Catastrophe Loss Costs in $B Reinsurance Managing Peak Exposures The property catastrophe business drives reinsurer profitability $150 $120 Earthquake Events Weather Events Man Made Events Katrina Rita Wilma Japan NZ Thailand $90 $60 Hurricane Andrew World Trade Center $30 $0 9

10 Long Term Interest Rates Interest Rates Generating Income from Reserves Low interest rates put pressure on long tail underwriters more so that short tail co s 15.0% 12.5% Long Term Interest Rates 10.0% 7.5% 5.0% 2.5% 0.0% 10

11 How does the Specialty Business Model look today? New capital sources pursue CAT, UW cycle in suppressed phase, interest rates low Insurance: Signs of price improvements in US [keeping up with trend] no obviously weak competitors or sign of true market turn Reinsurance: Challenging environment. Volatility lines show acceptable pricing, Standard lines weak pricing. Capital is accumulating faster than demand Mono-lines: Increasingly participating in M&A either in the form of sector consolidation or sales to specialty re-insurers THE CHALLENGE: HISTORIC CYCLE MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUE OF DIALING UP AND DOWN IS LESS VIABLE TODAY THAN HAS HISTORICALLY BEEN THE CASE => NEED A NEW STRATEGY

12 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium What are Specialty Companies doing to Break Free? New York - February 6-7, 2013

13 What is taking place? Geographic Expansion: Bermuda and Lloyds companies are building out US, European and Asia/Pacific operations Reinsurers are building out insurance operations Large syndicated risk insurers are building out small risk insurance platforms Mono-line specialty insurers are increasingly merging or selling themselves EVERYONE IS DOING EVERYTHING

14 What is causing it? Diversification: Increasing risk concentrations place increased emphasis on geographic/product diversification Disintermediation: Growing desire on the part of all players in our industry to eliminate layers of intermediation Search for Stability: Investors value predictable income and penalize volatility Mono-line M&A: Mono-lines have less access to capital and are strategically vulnerable when losses occur CONVERGENCE MAY NOT BE ELEGANT, BUT IT IS RATIONAL

15 Blending Portfolios and Strategies What can you add to the mix to mitigate the Catastrophes and the Cycles Large Risk Insurance Catastrophe Reinsurance Large risk E&S insurers build out small specialty insurance platforms Syndicated Risk Bermuda and Lloyds Highly cyclical revenues Highly cyclical margins Small Risk Specialty Insurance Stable revenues Stable margins Leverage UW expertise Low cost of capital Syndicated Risk High capital consumption Limited opportunities for additional diversification Large Risk Technical Lines Existing client base Modest infrastructure More equitable sharing of risk and rewards Bermuda and Lloyds players expanding to Zurich & Singapore Reinsurers buy, borrow and build insurance operations

16 What does it look like in practice Phone Box Stuffing? Less Risk and More Reward? After Global Diversification Before Global Diversification

17 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium Making it work in practice New York - February 6-7, 2013

18 That all sounds great but does it work? Is Diversified Specialty a contradiction in terms The financial rational for diversification is real, but so are the execution challenges: Focus Expenses Managing Knowledge Picking Products Common Platform Premiums & Profits UW & Analytics Culture Building Talent I THINK YOU SHOULD BE MORE EXPLICIT HERE IN STEP TWO

19 Focus Picking The Right Products What to do and what not to do What To Do Insurance: Professional Lines Adjacent mono-line specialty [MM, Surety, Crop, Volatility Lines Midsize commercial accessed regionally Reinsurance: Volatility Lines Technical Lines Capital Management Transactions What Not To Do Insurance: Personal Lines Comm. Standard Lines Workers Compensation Commercial Auto Multi Product Primary Reinsurance: Plays on pricing risk in cyclical lines Start Ups / New BUs Contingent/Tail covers

20 Managing Expenses The down side to diversification is expenses When building a diversified operation expenses grow as fast as revenues Common Underwriting Platform & Processes Standardized Product Development & Roll Out Common IT platform for non underwriting activities Common underwriting and management culture Increasing underwriter productivity and profitability are the keys to success

21 Performance Management Aligning teams, building businesses and fixing mistakes The key to building out a successful specialty business is simple: Try many different things Identify your mistakes and fix them Identify your winners and support them As easy as it sounds, it is really hard to do, particularly in a multi channel and product environment

22 Knowledge, Innovation and Products Re-Insurance is 400 years old but yet changes every year The two most valuable products in specialty reinsurance were re-launched in the last 10 years: D & O / E & O Insurance Catastrophe Reinsurance There is still plenty of room to innovate with respect to product design, customer segmentation, analytics and distribution

23 Culture Matters Specialty (Re)Insurance is part entrepreneurship part restraint Specialty companies are professional service firms that take risk with other peoples money: Underwriting skill drives results loss ratio matters more than expense ratio Talent is hard to find, harder to buy and far better to grow at home Very challenging to communicate across different businesses Ultimately specialty companies will be as good as their talent pool, maintaining a strong identifiable culture matters Looks like a culture of denial

24 2013 PLUS D&O Symposium Predictions for the next 10 years New York - February 6-7, 2013

25 Where does this all take us? What happens when 40+ specialty companies converge Soft Market / Hard Market Mergers & Acquisitions Reinsurers doing Insurance Capital Markets doing Reinsurance US vs. International Markets Bermuda, London, Zurich & Singapore