Guy Carpenter launches ground-breaking European Wildfire Risk Score
Guy Carpenter & Company, LLC, a leading global risk and reinsurance specialist and a business of Marsh McLennan (NYSE: MMC) has announced the launch of a Wildfire Risk Score designed to help clients manage their exposure to the evolving risk of wildfire across Europe. The solution builds on the approach successfully deployed in the U.S. and adds an additional peril geography to Guy Carpenter’s climate advisory offerings.
Clients are now able to produce two scores, one for properties at risk across Europe and one for risk to forestry for the Nordic region. In addition, various climate change scenarios can be applied to modify the risk scores based on a series of variations over time ranging from near current climate to an increase of +3.0 degrees.
Wildfire Risk Score enables clients to generate risk scores ranging from ‘Very Low’ to ‘Extreme’ instantaneously for all properties in their European portfolio. These scores can be used to assess portfolio exposure levels and potential wildfire accumulation risks, or to support underwriting decisions at the individual risk level. Further, the data can be applied to climate change-related regulatory reporting requirements.
Available through GC AdvantagePoint®, Guy Carpenter’s global risk analysis and visualization platform designed to transform data into actionable insights, Wildfire Risk Score can be integrated into a company’s existing workflows via API.
Commenting on the launch, Dr. Jessica Turner, Managing Director, Catastrophe Advisory, Guy Carpenter, said: “The evolving threat posed by wildfire across Europe requires companies to adopt a data-driven approach to adequately assess their current and future exposures. This ground-breaking European Wildfire Risk Score will allow our clients to gain a more accurate understanding of both current risk and in a warmer world. The launch forms part of Guy Carpenter’s wider goal of supporting better underwriting and enhancing our industry’s resilience to a rapidly changing climate.”
Pacific Life Re Announces the Appointment of Andrew Murphy as Head of Inforce Management, Europe
Pacific Life Re is pleased to announce the appointment of Andrew Murphy as its new Head of Inforce Management in the Europe Business Unit.
The newly created role, based in London, combines the Europe Corporate Actuarial and Operations teams under Andrew’s leadership.
Andrew has worked in the wider insurance industry for 17 years, joining Pacific Life Re in 2012, where he has worked across several areas of the business – Sales and Marketing, Pricing and most recently, Operations. Andrew takes up this role immediately and will work with Pacific Life Re senior leadership as the business unit transitions into its new structure.
Vincent Lepez, Managing Director, Europe, commented: “I am delighted that Andrew will be taking on this new role and look forward to working with him further to enhance the capabilities of our teams. I believe there should be stronger connectivity between the teams processing data from cedants and the teams using that inforce data for actuarial modelling, all trending towards one source of data and one common set of processes. Andrew is an invaluable member of the Pacific Life Re team and I am happy that we can build on his experience and expertise as we scale our business.”
Andrew Murphy, Head of Inforce Management, Pacific Life Re, added: “I am extremely proud to be taking on this new opportunity at Pacific Life Re. I believe that placing an even greater focus on data insights, technical analysis and our client relationships will be key to sustaining further growth and solidifying our position as a market leader.”
Lemonade Launches in France in Its Third European Country
Lemonade, the New York City-based insurance company powered by artificial intelligence and behavioral economics, has launched in France.
The launch marks the third EU country Lemonade has entered, following the Netherlands’ launch earlier this year, and Germany in June 2019.
Residents of France can now get renters insurance instantly, anytime, and from any device – as well as file claims and get paid in seconds through the Lemonade.
Unlike the traditional insurance model, Lemonade keeps a flat fee for its operations, and gives unused remaining money to nonprofits, as part of its annual Giveback program.
The company launched its homeowners and renters insurance in New York in late 2016, and has been one of the fastest growing insurance companies ever since. The company went public on July 2,2020 and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker LMND.
“Home insurance is often legally required in France, which makes it a compelling opportunity for Lemonade’s next European country launch,” said Daniel Schreiber, Lemonade CEO and co-founder. “While the French insurance market is one of the most developed globally, we believe that Lemonade’s unique mix of value, values, and technology will stand out to the French consumer, offering the ability to get fast, personalized, and mission-driven insurance, with a few taps.”
Similar to the German and Dutch products, the French product has the added benefit of being based on the company’s Policy 2.0, a new kind of insurance policy made for the 21st century, said Lemonade in a statement.
Policy 2.0 is a short, easy-to-understand, and transparent document designed for ordinary people (and not only for lawyers) – a consumer-friendly departure from the dense and dated policies that dominate the market.
Lemonade’s renters policy, which can be stopped and started at any time through the app, will start at just 4 euros (US$4.84) a month, and includes features that provide more extensive coverage than the typical industry standard policy, the company affirmed.
For example, Lemonade’s policy will offer an optional coverage to cover against theft both in and outside of your home, worldwide – so if a customer’s locked bike is stolen from the street, the customer could claim the bike’s full replacement value in minutes from the comfort of the Lemonade app.
Lemonade is licensed and supervised in Europe by the Dutch Central Bank (DNB), and has its European headquarters in Amsterdam.
Europe faces €1.77bn economic losses after severe June weather
The economic cost of a record breaking heatwave, severe storms and flooding in Europe in June 2019 is expected to exceed €1.774 billion ($2 billion), according to Aon’s monthly Global Catastrophe Recap report.
Between June 10 and 12, severe weather brought large hailstones, strong winds and intense rainfall across a number of Central European countries. Hail damage in the greater Munich metro region was significant while other areas of Germany, Poland, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Northern Italy were also hit.
The report estimated Europe-wide economic costs would be at least €915 million ($1.1 billion), with insurers expecting claims worth a minimum of €740 million ($830 million).
A second bout of severe storms affected Western and Central Europe on June 15 and 16, sweeping across Southwest France, canton Genève in Switzerland, Niedersachsen in
Germany and parts of the Czech Republic and Austria. France was the worst affected, with the government declaring a state of disaster. Aon reported that total economic losses resulting from large hail, severe winds and intense rainfall was expected to exceed €500 million ($560 million), with insurers covering most of the losses.
France also saw record breaking heat with the mercury reaching 45.9 degrees centigrade on June 28 in Gallargues le Montueux, which was the highest temperature ever recorded in the country.
Temperature records for June and daily records were broken across Germany, Spain, Poland, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Lichtenstein, Andorra, and the Czech Republic.
The heatwave, recorded between June 24 and July 1, killed 13 people across southwestern and central Europe, although that number is expected to increase.
Michal Lorinc, a catastrophe analyst in the Impact Forecasting team at Aon, said: “An active start to summer in the Northern Hemisphere featured many large-scale weather events including severe thunderstorms, flooding, extreme heatwaves, and drought. Europe was at the center of many of these perils as record temperatures engulfed parts of France, and large hail and damaging winds led to more than US$730 million in insured costs in Germany alone. Impact Forecasting currently has a fully probabilistic hail model available for several European countries to help clients better understand the growing risks associated with hail to property exposure.”
In the US, June brought powerful thunderstorms and flooding rains, which affected parts of the Rockies, Plains, and the Southeast from June 8 to 10. At least three people were killed and more than a dozen were injured. The total economic losses were estimated to be $575 million, with public and private insurers expected to payout $400 million.
China faced flooding in June as seasonal rainfall began across central and southern parts of the country. The worst affected regions were Guizhou, Jiangxi, Guangxi, and Guangdong where at least 200 people declared dead or missing. Nearly 200,000 homes and other structures were flooded, with more than 430,000 hectares (1.06 million acres) of crops damaged by water. Aon said the seasonal flood toll in China was listed at CNY42.4 billion ($6.1 billion).
China’s Sichuan Province was struck by a magnitude-5.8 earthquake on June 17, killing at least 13 people and injuring 226. While around 156,000 homes were damaged. The total economic losses were estimated to be at least CNY8.9 billion ($1.3 billion).
In India, ongoing drought conditions destroyed an estimated 60 percent of orange orchards in the state of Maharashtra. Potential losses were estimated from INR 50-70 billion ($720 million to $1 billion). This increased the India-wide year-to-date drought losses to around $1.75 billion.
Piraeus Bank Securities & Custody Services Wins Global Award in the category Emerging Markets Continued Excellence, Europe
Piraeus Bank received the Global Award in the category Emerging Markets Continued Excellence for the European region, as a recognition of its top quality service offering, from Global Custodian, the highly respected publication in the international securities services arena.Piraeus Bank is consistently awarded for its exemplary services, reflecting year after year its ability to create and foster long lasting client relationships, as well as demonstrate superior service levels and expertise in the Securities Services industry at a global scale.Global Custodian celebrated its landmark 30th Anniversary at the annual Leaders in Custody awards. The Global Custodian Awards for Excellence follow the GC industry-standard annual client surveys that rate the performance of the Securities Services’ providers and reward international Agent Banks.Mr. Panagiotis Papapetrou, Director, Strategy Planning & Sales, Securities Services at Piraeus Bank, received the Global Custodian Legend award for his key industry contribution in Greece and in Southeastern Europe and was thus inducted into the prestigious Global Custodian Hall of Fame.The ceremony took place at the Dorchester Hotel in London on March 28, 2019.