London market: Latest statistics show premium income increase.

The London insurance market has a gross premium income of around $80 billion, according to a survey by the IUA (International Underwriting Association).

The total does not include some broking income and other insurance services. Even so, it means that the half square mile that is home to the insurance end of the City has an economy slightly bigger than the whole of Slovenia.

The figures show the company sector of the London market (business written outside Lloyd’s) to have been worth just over £22 billion in 2011. This represents nearly half the total, being about £1 billion less than the Lloyd’s market.

The company sector comes out significantly bigger in the survey compared to 2010, mainly because better data collection has enabled the association to capture business that previously went missing from the statistics. On a like-for-like basis, the company sector was up 4.9% year-on-year and the London market as a whole up by more than 4%.

IUA chief executive Dave Matcham told a news briefing that, whilst not wanting to read too much into the figures, they supported the view that London was holding its own in the global insurance market.

The research finds that IUA members have the lion’s share (about 80%) of the UK large corporate risk sector, but is much smaller than Lloyd’s in others such as Marine and reinsurance. Whilst fifteen years ago the company sector was perceived to be reinsurancedominated, 80% of its business is now direct or facultative. The main classes of business are Property, Liability, Marine, Professional Lines and Motor. Most (54%) company market business comes from the UK or Ireland, whereas Lloyd’s is much more international.

This is the second IUA survey involving 57 insurance and reinsurance companies with operations in London. The association say that, having made improvements to data gathering since last time, it forms a robust baseline for detecting trends going forward.

Dave Matcham
IUA chief executive