Everest likes property cat reinsurance; might take more at mid-years

Reinsurance market discipline should hold through two sets of mid-year treaty renewal deadlines and very likely into 2025, top officials at global re/insurance group Everest are claiming. 

“We expect risk-adjusted returns to remain attractive through the upcoming renewals and into 2025,” CEO Juan Andrade told his company’s Q1 earnings call. 

Property and specialty lines top the rankings for discipline and trading conditions, he said.

Everest admits to market observation that capacity has risen as rate adequacy returned for key property lines via the 2023 market reset. 

“You would expect some of the pricing to moderate given that we’ve had rate on rate on rate,” Andrade said.  

But stability for the recently hiked attachment points the tightening of terms & conditions feels “even more important” as a sign of strong risk-adjusted returns, Andrade said. 

Top cedants are coming to market with incrementally higher demand “and we are leaning in,” Andrade said. 

Everest’s COO and chief of both reinsurance and insurance operations Jim Williamson had praise for the market’s ability to hold the line.  New comers have arrived and capacity has risen, but with “just a floor under discipline,” informed in part by a continuing string of nat cat losses. 

“As we roll into the rest of 2024 with Florida in June and 7.1 driven by Australian, we expect discipline to be maintained, risk-adjusted economics should be terrific and our expectation remains that this will continue in 2025,” Williamson said. 

Some of the mid-year growth rates may look strong if taken against a suppressed prior-year appetite and if Everest’s more recent appetite from January and April renewals now holds. Officials variously cited 24% property cat growth at 1.1 and 10% global at 4.1, albeit with a 76% gain in North American property cat. 

Cedants are likewise still chasing facultative solutions to fill in gaps in towers after attachment points rose, Williamson said, citing 14% growth year over year in Q1. 

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