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29th March 2020

Newslink Global Insurance Trends-Editor's Weekly Overview
Trend

This week, COVID-19 continued to dominate the headlines. An S&P Global report said the virus will test insurer's resilience, and Fitch revised its outlook for the underlying fundamentals of the global reinsurance sector to negative from stable due to increased concerns. A Forrester Research report highlighted the potential COVID-!9 impact and opportunities for the insurance market. The Chair of the Treasury Select Committee wrote to the Association of British Insurers(ABI) regarding the industry response to the Coronavirus outbreak to which the ABI responded-UK travel insurers expect to make record payouts to customers and Business Interruption coverage was also outlined. The Chartered Insurance Institute(CII) advised on how to prepare for a claims surge. Insurance Europe was amongst a group of ten associations lobbying to keep European financial markets open during the pandemic, and the CII urged the Financial Conduct Authority(FCA) to support the profession to ensure consumer access to financial advice.
Lloyd's said it is in strong position to respond to the impacts of COVID-19 after its return to profit in 2019 was reported. Willis Towers Watson launched a new, real-time, risk and analytics feature providing up-to-date information on confirmed global COVID-19 cases alongside clients’ property total insured values by location, and also announced that a COVID-19 Actuaries’ Response Group had been formed. MAPFRE is to donate E5m to the Spanish National Research Council to accelerate the investigation into COVID-19, and SCOR launched an insurance information platform in China. The latest Beazley Breach Briefing indicated that Ransomware attacks skyrocketed in 2019 as the working from home trend increases, whilst GlobalData said that Japan's motor insurance market is to face stagnation over the next four years due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Brexit however was not forgotten as the House of Lords EU Financial Affairs Sub-Committee asked the Chancellor to urge Government to support UK/EU structured dialogue to support cross-border financial services. Insurance Europe published a response to a consultation by the EC on its proposal for a digital operational resilience framework for financial services, and also released a reply to a consultation by the European Data Protection Board(EDPB) on draft guidelines for processing personal data related to connected vehicles. India’s reinsurance market is to reach $7.8bn by 2024 driven by offshore investments, according to GlobalData.
The Tractable AI solution for full estimation of car accident damage is being used by Ageas UK, and Duck Creek announced a new relationship with BitSight, a leading provider of security ratings. Cryptoasset insurer Evertas plans to launch an MGA, and Blenheim Underwriting was granted ‘Approval in Principle’ by the Lloyd’s Board to establish a new managing agency. BMS acquired in Spain. The London & International Insurance Brokers’ Association's(LIIBA) new chair will be Richard Dudley, chief executive of Aon’s UK global broking centre.

Full articles on the above topics are included in those added this week to the Newslink Global Trends Database Research Matrix service at www.onlystrategic.com
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