PB Week: Strategy, results and an opportunity
For those who are not on holiday at the moment, doesn't it seem like the rest of the world is, writes Andrew Tjaardstra, editor of Professional Broking in the latest PB Week . Poor weather, out of office e-mails and smug people returning from sunny climbs complaining about the wind and the rain signal that it is well and truly the holiday season, and yet how are we still sat at our desks?
Allianz results
On Monday, Allianz's chief executive Andrew Torrance had said that his insurer's latest half year results were unsatisfactory citing that rates had not increased by as much as he had hoped. Profits have marginally increased by 3.2% over last year to £94m but this included a similar amount of reserve releases as last year and yet there were no floods this time. It appears the soft market years have finally caught up with all the insurers, although so far no job cuts have been necessary from Allianz unlike its rivals Norwich Union, Axa and Zurich.
Oak lunch
On Tuesday, I managed to catch up with Bob Trott, managing director at Oak Underwriting who says business is going well and that his outings to the cricket such as the latest test at Oval, with the usual suspects such as Simon Cooter and Paul Samways, are business useful. He also tried to use me as an intermediary to get an invite to Wentworth from a broker, no doubt for another business meeting. Bob was in such a good mood he said that he was looking forward to breathe red wine and garlic over his favourite underwriter at Chaucer after lunch. Nice image Bob!
PB Strategy
Last Friday the PB team had a strategy day - outside in the sunshine on Friday and have developed some exciting ideas for the magazine next year. So watch this space! However, before talking up next year, we have some big plans for the last quarter. So here is some shameless plugging: in September, we will carry a Little Book of Market Expertise in association with Zurich; and the results of the latest Sentiment Survey sponsored by Groupama Insurances will be available in October alongside the latest the Little Book of Business Law supplied in conjunction with DAS. If that was not enough, there is the opportunity for you to attend the PB Management Event at four venues across the country in October - so remember to sign up now. And you will be pleased to know that our strategy in 2009 is to continue providing all of this for free.
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