OREANDA-NEWS. December 2, 2010. Ingosstrakh became a general partner and participant in the traditional November business meetings of reinsurers which were held in Moscow on November 23rd-24th of this year. More than 290 registered delegates participated in the event. They represented insurance, reinsurance and brokerage companies from Europe and Asia. The head of Ingosstrakh’s directorate for incoming obligatory reinsurance, Igor Alexeev, was the chairperson of the organizational committee of the November conferences. Ingosstrakh has participated in the November business meetings of reinsurers for eight years.

During the event the participants shared their opinions on the current situation in the reinsurance market. According to Igor Alexeev, head of Ingosstrakh’s directorate for incoming obligatory reinsurance, ‘2010 is looking to be the toughest year for reinsurers in recent history. Past savings have been spent and now reinsurers can only rely on whatever they saved up during the crisis. The situation most Russian reinsurers are in is especially precarious; foreign companies are mostly doing OK, some of them are even strengthening their positions in Russia. In the meantime Russian regional reinsurers are facing a situation where they have no resources for growth. The main difficulty is that the current shareholders and management of Russian reinsurers seem to have mostly exhausted their own resources for growth. Consequently they need to attract new investors from the outside. But our reinsurance sector is not attractive enough for ordinary investors to be interested in such assets. Thus the only two options left are merging or selling out to a specialised investor who understands how reinsurance works,’ stated Mr Alexeev.

Talking about the reinsurance activity results Igor Alexeev noted that financial performance is more important than gross sales. ‘The crisis brought it home for us that financial performance is the foundation that everything else doesn’t make much sense without.

Another problem is that a lot of the major players in the Russian reinsurance market don’t particularly like to pay out compensation for damages. And the willingness to pay out compensations is the main difference between a company that wants to build a long term reinsurance business and an outfit that’s just out for a quick buck. Ingosstrakh pays more reinsurance compensations than any other company in the Russian reinsurance market,’ stressed Igor Alexeev.

The November business meetings of reinsurers have been held since 2002 and have become a popular venue for presenting reinsurance products to wide audiences. The meetings provide a unique opportunity to conduct a large number of bi-lateral conferences and negotiations with partners and secure reliable reinsurance protection for your company. The meetings of reinsurers in Moscow follow logically form the international meetings in Monte-Carlo and Baden-Baden. Participants try to prepare itineraries of negotiations in advance to capitalise as much as possible on the opportunities provided by this largest forum of the Russian and international reinsurance community to strengthen and expand one’s business and find the most effective reinsurance solutions.