This article was produced in partnership with Travelers Europe
Mia Wallace, of Insurance Business, sat down with Christopher Unwin, senior development underwriter at Travelers Europe, to discuss what Travelers Europe’s newly expanded FI appetite means for the market.
The recently rediscovered delight of getting out into the market to meet brokers and clients face to face has yet to subside for senior development underwriter Christopher Unwin (pictured) and the wider Financial Institutions (FI) team of Travelers Europe. To boost already high spirits, the team is newly equipped with a positive message for the market – Travelers has a revamped FI appetite.
To better understand how the broadening of Travelers’ market offering has come about means looking back to when Travelers first started writing FI in 2008. Since then, its core appetite has been around the asset management piece – a post-financial crash focus that has worked very well for the insurer to date. The sector has traditionally been very high-performing, Unwin said, boasting a favourable claims profile given the level of claims activity.
“But over the years, with more competition coming into the market and relatively few claims within the space – the premiums tend to get a little bit depressed,” he said. “And, excluding recent years, we’ve experienced a prolonged soft market, which presents its own challenges. That being said, it is well-performing and an area a lot of insurers want to participate in, so competition is really fierce.”
“What we’ve done over the last year or two is look at our book and the FI space as a whole because the sector is a lot more vast than just the asset management arena. So, we’ve assessed the market to see where we can help both brokers and clients – and offer our Travelers service to a broader sphere of the FI market. There are lots of areas other than our core appetite where clients need solutions to their risks, and it’s something we think we can provide for going forward.”
Unwin emphasised that this is a broadening of Travelers’ appetite rather than a wholesale shift in strategy for the insurer, and that the core appetite of the team will remain while new risks are brought under the remit of FI coverage, including broader appetite within the insurance, banking, wealth management and trust company sectors. Looking closer at what this expanded appetite entails, he noted that three key stakeholders will be impacted by the move – clients, brokers and Travelers itself.
First on the agenda is clients as this will mean that Travelers can now support a greater number and range of clients, especially those with more complex risk exposures. Then on the broking side, he said, Travelers will be able to further support brokers with their growth plans as they look to place more complex risks within the market.
“Where we can,” he continued, “we will look to provide some more capacity to the market on some of the placements where, over the last couple of years of hard market conditions, capacity has been restricted. This should help in situations where clients might have previously experienced difficulty in securing their desired capacity. We think this will really help the broking community and will strengthen our relationships with brokers [as] it’s going to allow us to assist in more cases than we might have done in the past.”
Finally, the expansion brings a wide range of benefits for Travelers, he said, as it helps the business diversify its book – improving performance by reducing the likelihood of shocks from systemic risks impacting the book. It also allows the insurer to interact with more broker partners, widen its footprint and boost strong internal collaboration and cross-selling capabilities.
“With this broadening of appetite, we’re looking at different risks that might have different limit profiles, and that helps us to diversify our book – in terms of the limits we deploy,” he said, “but also maybe in some of the territories we look to operate in. And this all helps with downside protection in the event of losses across the book.”
The move is a logical next step for Travelers which has served the FI market through thick and thin for the last 14 years, supported by a highly experienced team and a strong market reputation (Travelers’ insurance company is AA rated while its syndicate is rated A+). The FI team is also fortunate to have a variety of options from a capacity perspective, Unwin said. Alongside the company stamp and the UK and European company capacity it can deploy, it also has the Lloyd’s stamp, with both the UK and European components.
“That gives brokers and clients the flexibility to choose the capacity they want,” he said. “Then in terms of our geographic reach, Travelers is licenced to write in around 90 countries, so providing the risks meet our risk profile and appetite, we can consider risks from further afield”.
To support that geographic piece, Unwin said, Travelers has ramped up its footprint on the ground in recent years with underwriters spread out across a range of locations in the UK and Ireland to support the diversification of its book across different broker networks and in different regions. He also highlighted the experience and diversity of Travelers’ FI team which is made of individuals from a range of technically-orientated backgrounds.
“We’re a market that has been consistently writing FI since 2008,” he said. “I’ve been in the market for over 10 years and I’ve seen a number of insurers enter and exit the space, or drastically change their appetite. I think our consistency is really valued in the market - we have some clients that we have written for, for over a decade. Being an insurer that is here for the long-term is great for our relationships with clients, but also with brokers – because they can trust that we’re a brand that is enduring and here to consistently support their clients.”
Find out more about Travelers’ Financial Institutions cover, and its new appetite here
Christopher Unwin is a senior development underwriter with Travelers Europe, bringing over a decade of experience serving the insurance profession to the role.
