Luke Harrison

There is a growing interest in property risk where captives are increasingly being utilised as vehicles to assume greater risk retention, according to Adriana Scherzinger, head of captives at Zurich.

Zurich Global Employee Benefits Solutions (ZGEBS) has introduced enhanced digital reports, online customer collaboration platforms and automated data transfer.

With overnight borrowing rates anticipated to come down this year, captives may be advised to alter their investment strategies and invest in intermediate maturity, high quality fixed-income sectors to maximise returns from a changing fiscal environment.

MAXIS Global Benefits Network has partnered with Abi Global Health, a virtual care platform that connects patients to a local healthcare professional using artificial intelligence (AI).

The increasing need for alternative solutions to fulfil demand for property cover continued to dominate discussions at this year’s Vermont Captive Insurance Association (VCIA) annual conference in August.

The Vermont Department of Financial Regulation has licenced 31 new captives in the first seven months of the year, compared to 23 for the same period in 2023.

AM Best has upgraded the financial strength rating to A- (excellent) from B++ (good) and the long-term issuer credit rating to “a-” (excellent) from “bbb+” (good) of Switzerland-domiciled Sigurd Rück AG. The outlook for the ratings is stable.

Captive recruiters are expanding beyond traditional areas to attract talent from other areas of the insurance sector as well as from entirely different industries, aiming to address an alarming talent shortage in the industry.