Buying American commercial insurers is a “strategy that could prove rewarding” for Canadian insurance companies, executives from Toronto-based DBRS wrote in a report released Thursday. Expanding into the U.S. commercial space “requires significant resources,” wrote Stewart McIlwraith, senior vice president…
The market for property and casualty insurance brokerages continues to be intense, with books of business attracting prices from three-and-a-half to five times commissions – and even more for online business, Mike Berris, partner and practice group leader with Vancouver-based…
Prompted by the emergence of new triggers, business interruption remains a top risk according to the 2017 Allianz Risk Barometer, which defines it as “a loss of income that could impair a company’s revenue stream and thus [trigger] a shortfall…
Blockchain is going to put pressure on broker commissions and fundamentally change the way the broker channel does business over the next three to five years, says a past Marsh Canada national executive and management committee member. Blockchain will reduce…
With rates on the rise in personal home and auto insurance lines, retaining existing clients could potentially be a great growth strategy for brokers going forward, Aviva Canada advises. “The opportunity to get more rate from existing clients is one…
B.C.’s Supreme Court has allowed a bad faith claim to proceed against the Insurance Corporation of B.C. in the case of a Ferrari repair that cost the government insurer almost $800,000 — about $100,000 more than what the car was…
Although every Canadian auto insurance system has its problems, a special advisor to Ontario’s finance minister did an “excellent job” in describing the problems specific to that province, says the head of RSA Canada. “I don’t think there is an…
Brokers or managing general agents (MGA) looking to buy another MGA could be looking at multiples of four times commission just to be able to compete with insurers looking to make the same purchase, industry analysts say. Philip Heywood, partner…
Fancy kitchen faucets that start and stop with a wave of the hand–or a feline paw–have contributed to some curious flood claims. In his presentation about appliance fires and flood claims, Mazen Habash, president of forensic engineering firm Origin and…
You are providing risk advice to a company accused of wrongdoing. What do you think about your client offering voluntary gift cards as a strategy to reduce liability? The question is currently before the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in…
Despite last year’s devastating hurricanes, investors are happy to keep shovelling money into cat bonds and insurance-linked securities (ILS), which in turn are making reinsurers think twice about hiking rates. The catastrophe bond and ILS markets have “grown hugely over…
Succession planning has triggered an uptick in brokerage mergers and acquisitions over the last couple of years, an industry analyst told Canadian Underwriter recently. “I would say there’s an uptick in assets coming to market that are owner-operated, where succession…