Bermuda Insurance Market

The UK insurance daily newspaper Lloyd's List has reiterated its claim that the Department of Trade & Industry is concerned about the quality of Bermuda's reinsurance market - despite an angry letter from the Bermuda Ministry of Finance.

Potential losses from breast implant litigation in the United States should not cause undue problems for Bermuda-based excess liability carriers ACE and XL, both companies said this week.

Potential losses from breast implant litigation in the United States should not cause undue problems for Bermuda-based excess liability carriers ACE and XL, both companies said this week.

Partner Reinsurance Company, the $1 billion property catastrophe reinsurer which opened for business last month, has firmly defended its controversial policy of offering capacity direct to reinsurance buyers.Unlike other markets on the island, Partner Re prefers not to conduct business through placing brokers — a philosophy which has not endeared it to the reinsurance intermediaries.

Partner Reinsurance Company, the $1 billion property catastrophe reinsurer which opened for business last month, has firmly defended its policy of offering capacity direct to reinsurance buyers.Partner Re president and chief executive officer Herbert Haag said this week that Swiss Re, one of Partner Re's founding shareholders and the supplier of essential underwriting services to the catastrophe company, had already established a "clear tradition" of writing direct.

Sphere Drake Holdings is injecting $100 million into its lightly-capitalised Bermuda subsidiary to enable it to write up to $130 million of net premiums over the next 12 months.The new capital is coming from the group's recently-concluded initial public offering which raised $136.7 million.

Focus Insurance chief Mark Hardy has publicly apologized to the Supreme Court for disobeying its orders freezing assets he held here and overseas. The verbal apology, which Mr Hardy asked the court to view in light of "horrendous litigation over the last three years", was delivered to the Chief Justice of Bermuda during the course of a two-hour open hearing. Mr Hardy, now an adjudged bankrupt who described himself as "a strong believer in the rule of law", told the court he had been through hell during the last few months because he had been litigating in person.

Bankrupt businessman Mark Hardy, the former head of the insolvent Focus Insurance group, is returning to Bermuda - to personally apologize to the Supreme Court for ignoring its orders.The apology will be offered in compliance with a ruling by Britain's Privy Council, the highest court of appeal for litigants in UK protected territories, that Mr Hardy first "purge" his standing with the Bermuda court before the Privy Council hears his appeal.

Former Focus Insurance director David Thirkill is planning to raise $150 million to start a new financial or finite risk insurance company on the island.The company, which has not yet been incorporated, is to be called Stellar Insurance — a name that Mr Thirkill said had already been reserved.

Focus Insurance chief Mark Hardy was yesterday adjudged bankrupt by an English court.However Mr Hardy, who has long claimed he would not receive justice until a suit for negligence started against him in Bermuda by Focus liquidators was brought before an English judge, warned last night that his legal battle was "far from over".

The run off of Walton Insurance Ltd, a Bermuda-based carrier formerly owned by Phillips Petroleum, is to be transferred to the UK in a cost-cutting move that will lead to the loss of 11 jobs.Announcing the relocation, president Tim Spafford said that a further six jobs will also be axed with the closing of an affiliated Bermuda company, Insurance and Reinsurance Services Ltd — a company that specialised in claims audit services.

A Bermuda-based insurance company's president and his wife are thought to have gone into hiding after a Federal court in Dallas last week found them guilty of fraud.Neill and Florence Portermain were also found to have taken money from the company under false pretences and were ordered to pay a Bermudian liquidator $17.6 million in damages and interest.

Creditors of insolvent Mentor Insurance have given near unanimous support to a proposed "scheme of arrangement" under which the bulk of the company's $175 million of remaining assets are to be distributed by the end of 1994. Of 277 creditors represented at a brief special meeting here on Tuesday, all but one voted for the scheme. The 276 supporting creditors represented claims against the company to the value of $310 million.

Insurance companies seldom come to Bermuda for banking services alone.But they'd be unlikely to stay without them. How else would the 1,324 insurance and reinsurance corporations domiciled here manage the billions of dollars of premiums ($15.41 billion gross and $11.81 billion net at the last count) they write every year?Yet while an efficient banking system has clearly been helpful to the Bermuda insurance industry, it is no less true that the specialised demands of Bermuda's insurers have served to work wonders for the financial systems of Britain's oldest colony.

Belvedere Insurance says it will fight a legal action begun against its parent Caliban Holdings this week.

Bermuda's Chief Justice Sir James Astwood has ordered the arrest of former Focus Insurance chairman Mark Hardy for disobeying the Supreme Court's orders.Sir James said that he was holding UK-based Mark Gregory Hardy in contempt of court for violating injunctions issued in July 1991 and February 1992 freezing his personal assets worldwide. He ruled yesterday that Mr Hardy be arrested and brought before him on January 8 "to show cause why I should not commit him to prison".

Anchor Underwriting Managers has won a contract to run off its main client, Paumanock Insurance, Anchor chairman and chief executive officer Robin Spencer-Arscott revealed last night."Contrary to reports, I'm happy to say that we'll be handling the Paumanock run off," said Mr Spencer-Arscott.

Anchor Underwriting chief Robin Spencer-Arscott is this week fighting to save jobs after the company was put on notice that Paumanock Insurance, its biggest underwriting account, is going into run off.Anchor, one of Bermuda's leading underwriting managers, has 27 staff, many of them working on Paumanock business.

Former Focus Insurance director David Thirkill is feeling "relieved and vindicated" in the wake of an Appeal Court decision striking out a $20 million civil action started against him by Focus liquidators.The liquidators began the action in the summer of 1990 when they sued Focus' directors and officers for willful negligence and breach of fiduciary duty.The Appeal Court decision, handed down on Monday, overturns a ruling by Chief Justice Sir James Astwood who this year refused to dismiss the suit, ruling that it contained assertions which, if proved at trial, would show the directors deliberately disregarded their duties.

Paumanock Insurance Company Ltd, the Bermuda-based reinsurance subsidiary of the Grumman Corporation, has ceased underwriting and is to go into run off.No official reason has been given for the move which sent shockwaves through the island's insurance community. However, it is believed that Grumman is preparing to sell the Bermuda subsidiary.

Mentor Insurance creditors met on November 13 to review the workings of a proposed "scheme of arrangement" designed to put Bermuda's biggest ever insolvency on course for completion by the end of 1994 and its creditors in line for a further 15 cents in the dollar.

Mentor Insurance creditors will today review the workings of a proposed "scheme of arrangement" designed to put Bermuda's biggest ever insolvency on course for completion by the end of 1994 and creditors in line for a further 15 cents in the dollar.

Mid Ocean Reinsurance Company is on the verge of announcing not whether it will open its doors for business, but when.

Mid Ocean Reinsurance, the proposed new $300 million property catastrophe reinsurer being organised in Bermuda, is close to becoming a reality.

Bermuda-based financial reinsurer, Independence Insurance Co Ltd has stopped writing new or renewal business and is asking policyholders whether they wish to commute or novate existing contracts or have them run off.

London Market brokers have collected more than $5 million for the account of the insolvent Bermuda-based Aneco Reinsurance Underwriting Ltd, the first meeting of Aneco creditors was told in Bermuda March 26.However the funds are subject to a "mareva injunction" freezing all Aneco's assets in the United Kingdom, according to provisional liquidator Malcolm Butterfield.

Aneco Reinsurance creditors have formally rejected an attempt by Aneco chairman Mark Hardy to block the appointment of liquidators from the accounting firm of Coopers and Lybrand. Attending their first meeting yesterday at the Chamber of Commerce, they voted overwhelmingly that C&L's Peter Mitchell and Christopher Hughes be named joint liquidators of Aneco - formerly one of the leading underwriters of captive reinsurance business in Bermuda.

Norad Reinsurance Company is insolvent by almost $34.6 million according to liquidators' latest statistics released to approximately 100 creditors last week.The figure represents the estimated size of the net deficiency of assets to meet total liabilities of just under $37.6 million. But liquidator David Brown says efforts to collect outstanding amounts from Norad's reinsurers are by no means over and could yet help swell the Norad estate by the best part of a million dollars.

The Dallas Cowboys, the San Francisco 49ers, the LA Rams and six other NFL teams are being sued for at least $14.5 million by Bermuda liquidators working on the winding-up of the insolvent mutual N.F.L. Insurance Ltd (NFLIL).Liquidators David Lines and Peter Mitchell claim that the defendants, who were all members of the mutual, are jointly and severally liable to NFLIL for the as yet indeterminate cost of winding it up and for the mutual insurer's debts and liabilities of more than $14.5 million.

For the first time since their appointment in the summer of 1985, Mentor Insurance liquidators have detected a dim ray of light coming from what they hope will prove to be the end of a very long tunnel.

Aneco Reinsurance Underwriting Ltd chairman Mark Hardy has instructed his lawyers to commence legal proceedings against the underwriters, cedants and brokers responsible for handling Aneco's property catastrophe book of business. The action, to be brought either in Bermuda or in London, will seek damages in connection with the underwriting and placement of this business with Aneco.

Aneco Reinsurance Underwriting Ltd, the beleaguered Bermuda-based reinsurer which is fighting three separate applications to have it placed in liquidation, has won an appeal, on technical grounds, against a winding-up petition started six months ago by Mutual Indemnity Ltd.But the Bermuda Appeal Court's decision, handed down November 28, is already the subject of intense legal scrutiny which may yet produce an appeal to Britain's Privy Council - the highest court of appeal for litigants in the UK's dependent territories.