An insurance industry supported wildfire mitigation designation program has been expanded into 10 additional high-risk states with Florida being one. The expansion comes at a time when Florida is experiencing widespread drought conditions and state officials are concerned that the next few months could be extremely active for wildfires. Nearly 80% of Florida is in an extreme or exceptional drought, according to the Florida Department of Agriculture. The Wildfire Prepared program from the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) offers designations that show home owners and builders in high-risk areas have taken proven steps to reduce wildfire risk.…
Author: Awais
Citing progress on a potential compromise with the insurance industry’s rate bureau, North Carolina Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey has rescheduled a hearing on proposed dwelling insurance rate increases from May 4 to July 6. The North Carolina Rate Bureau is asking for an average 28.5% hike that would take effect on July 1, 2026 and then another 31% average rate increase on July 1, 2027. The combined effect would be a 68.3% increase. “The Department of Insurance and the N.C. Rate Bureau have made progress in reaching a settlement,” Causey said in announcing the rescheduling. “More time is needed to…
Helvetia Baloise Holding AG said it aims to return some 2.8 billion Swiss francs ($3.6 billion) to investors over the period to 2028, as the newly-merged insurer sets financial targets for the first time. The company proposed a dividend of 7.70 Swiss francs per share for 2025 and said that by 2029 it is aiming to increase that by more than 50%, according to a statement on Wednesday. Announced a year ago, the combination created Switzerland’s second largest insurer and marked one of the biggest deals in European finance in 2025. The insurers have said the merger will result in…
Russia’s intelligence services are now seeking to damage European infrastructure with cyber attacks rather than merely overwhelm websites with excess traffic, Swedish Civil Defense Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin said. “Over the past year, Russia’s methods have shifted,” Bohlin said during a news conference in Stockholm on Wednesday. “Pro-Russian groups that once carried out denial-of-service attacks are now attempting destructive cyber attacks against organizations in Europe.” Bohlin’s statement underscores European officials’ growing concern about the vulnerability of critical systems including power plants and water treatment works to disruption by Russian operatives. Poland fought off a wave of cyber attacks by Russian intelligence…
The story behind the lawsuit goes like this. On or about May 9, 2024, a fire tore through a property at 1760 Gypsum Creek Road in Gypsum, Colorado. The property, owned by SV Ranch, LLC, was leased to tenant Myrtle Frenz, who had left that morning with her four dogs still at the property. When Frenz returned hours later, she found the damage – and noticed that one of the range’s front control knobs had been turned to the “on” position. Frenz suspects one of her dogs bumped the knob while she was out, inadvertently switching on a heating element…
The number of babies born in the United States fell again last year. According to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were 3.6 million births in 2025, a 1% decline from 2024. The fertility rate dropped to 53.1 births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44, down 23% since 2007. The Trump administration has said it wants to reverse this trend. President Donald Trump has called for “a new baby boom,” and aides have solicited proposals from outside advocates and policy groups ranging from baby bonuses to expanded fertility planning. The administration is also proposing…
According to the filing, Wulff formed Augmenta Advisory on February 10, 2026 – the very same day an insurance application was submitted through Corgi’s online underwriting platform under Augmenta’s name. The lawsuit alleges Augmenta had no federal employer identification number, no revenue, no clients, no website, and no actual business operations. It existed, the suit claims, for one reason: to give a direct competitor a way into Corgi’s platform without being recognized.
Africa’s leading multilateral insurer of trade risk is seeking around $500 million in capital from partners to support countries that face higher costs as a result of conflict in the Middle East, its chief executive told Reuters. African Trade & Investment Development Insurance was seeking to increase its existing capital base of close to $1 billion even before U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on Iran at the end of February unleashed a war that is likely to increase inflation across the globe. Its CEO Manuel Moses told Reuters the Middle Eastern crisis had made the problem urgent. “Demand is coming faster than we…
European Central Bank supervisors are set to quiz bankers about the risks that Anthropic’s new artificial intelligence model might supercharge cyberattacks, one source familiar with the situation told Reuters on Wednesday. Anthropic’s Mythos is seen by cybersecurity experts as posing significant challenges to the banking industry and its legacy technology systems, raising alarm bells among regulators in Britain and the U.S. ECB supervisors are gathering information about the model, with a view to asking banks on their watch about their preparedness for this new possible source of risk, said the source who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are…
The world’s largest insurance brokers recently found themselves caught in an “AI scare trade” after news that Tuio home insurance would soon be available via ChatGPT. Shares fell sharply, as investors questioned whether intermediaries could be bypassed altogether. That reaction misunderstands where value sits in broking — and how AI is actually being deployed inside the industry. The fear was misplaced because it ignored a simple reality: broking value is rooted in judgment, structuring expertise, and market navigation — not in the mechanics of data processing AI is not disintermediating brokers. It is changing how broking operations run. “Disintermediation fears…
For years, a segment of the Florida property insurance industry had lobbied for more access to the lower-cost reinsurance offered by the state-sanctioned Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund—mainly through a lowered retention, or deductible, level. Today, three years into Florida’s tort-reform era, things are changing. Private reinsurance rates have fallen steadily. “Insurers renewing at April 1 achieved significant savings in all regions, building on the competitive conditions seen at January 1,” Aon said in its April renewal report. And with the Florida Cat Fund’s rates set to rise this year, some insurers have noticed that, at least for some layers, private…
The recent launch of NovaCore’s new collateralized reinsurance sidecar NovaRe, backed by alternative investment firm New Mountain Capital, LLC, through the establishment of VictoryRe, reflects New Mountain’s conviction in specialty insurance and aligns with its strategy for building integrated and scaled businesses, Steve Klinsky, CEO and Founder has said.As we previously reported, VictoryRe has been established as a new platform by New Mountain Capital and NovaRe as a collateralized reinsurance sidecar structure within it, to provide collateralized capacity to back programs of business written by Novacore. The launch of VictoryRe marks the firm’s entry into the reinsurance carrier market with…
Scott Stephenson, former chairman, president, and CEO of Verisk Analytics, joined the board of directors at ZestyAI, a San Francisco, California-based risk and decision intelligence platform for the insurance industry. Stephenson spent more than two decades at Verisk, including nine as chairman, president, and CEO (2013–2022), where he helped transform the company into a global data and analytics leader. Under his leadership, Verisk more than quadrupled its market capitalization, became a component of the S&P 500 Index, and was repeatedly named one of the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Forbes. Before Verisk, Stephenson was a senior partner at the Boston…
Aon plc is expanding its proprietary Data Center Lifecycle Insurance Program (DCLP) with an additional $1 billion, increasing the program’s capacity to $3.5 billion. In addition, coverage will extend to include existing data centers coming off the first year of operations. With this enhancement, Aon’s DCLP now provides continuity of coverage into long‑term operations, extending coordinated support to existing, mission‑critical data center assets beyond construction and commissioning. “Data centers have become foundational to innovation, connectivity and economic growth,” said Joe Peiser, CEO of Risk Capital at Aon, in a statement. “As these assets grow in size, complexity and importance, resilience…