60: James Vickers, Willis Re, April 2021 - On reinsurance market performance & capital conditions

James Vickers, Chairman of Willis Re International, part of the global reinsurance broking unit of Willis Towers Watson, joined us to discuss global reinsurance market conditions and opportunities.  In this interview, James Vickers discusses how Willis Re's reinsurance clients are finding market conditions in the context of some steady firming seen across recent renewal seasons.  We discussed global reinsurance capital levels and why, despite the industry being well-capitalised and having bounced back strongly from the pandemic, we continue to see positive rate momentum.  James explained some of the underlying features of reinsurance performance at this time, explaining the challenges that reinsurers face in a low interest rate world. As well as the need for underwriting returns to improve further, particularly when some reinsurers have new capital investors to satisfy at this time.  We also discussed the recent performance of the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market and James explained that he feels ILS funds and investors have learned a lot after some more challenging years, which he feels means the discipline being seen in ILS capital deployment is set to continue.  Finally, James shared his market outlook, saying that he sees no reason for firming rates not to continue at this time.

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