J&H Marsh & McLennan

Plans to operate a new reinsurance company in Bermuda called Global Markets Access have been shelved. The company's organizers, who included several people involved in the successful launch last year of Annuity & Life Re, could not raise enough start-up capital, even though the original target was lowered from $350 million to $200 million last month.

Bermuda's most successful insurance investment partnership, between Marsh & McLennan (now J&H Marsh & McLennan) and JP Morgan, may be coming to an acrimonious end.The two giants of the investment and insurance sectors, who were responsible for the formation of companies such as ACE, EXEL and Mid Ocean, have fallen out, apparently over Merrill Lynch being preferred to JP Morgan in lucrative insurance deals involving companies JP Morgan helped set up, we have been told.

The PLP has only been in power a month but there are already signs that the party's stance on work permits for foreign employees might be tougher than previous governments. A permit has not been renewed for Paul Rowlerson, a Senior Vice President with J&H Marsh & McLennan, after 14 years on the island in the insurance sector, according to a story in The Royal Gazette newspaper.