Zurich won't bulk up on reinsurance, but adjust new books

Zurich will stand by its reinsurance strategy but seek to avoid chasing ever more coverage to keep pace with its growing business by managing the shape of new risks it brings to its books, group chief financial officer George Quinn (pictured) told analysts during the third quarter earnings call on Thursday (November 11).

“I don’t expect to significantly change the programme we have in place,” Quinn said. “We like a combination of something that gives us some protection from frequency and something more significant that protects us from severity.”

“So we would be looking to maintain, as close as we can, the structure we have today,” he said.

But reinsurers can’t look to the Zurich top line for their own guidance on new business from the Swiss group, Quinn warned. Zurich will work the structure of its own growth to counter its reinsurance needs.

“I would rather manage the incoming risk than to look to buy more reinsurance,” Quinn said. “We will use incoming to manage that rather than get too reliant on reinsurance.”

The approach is similar in managing catastrophe loss target, where Zurich begins by adjusting “what we bring into the group in the first place,” Quinn suggests. “We manage this to get an outcome that is consistent with the guidance we give you.”

Did you get value from this story?  Sign up to our free daily newsletters and get stories like this sent straight to your inbox.