Commercial insurance and reinsurance rates will remain flat for the rest of the year, according to Marsh & McLennan. In an internet conference call last week, Marsh said that buyers of property/casualty policies had not seen much change in their premiums in the year to date, although on average prices dropped 2%, and that the trend is expected to continue for the next three months, barring any major natural catastrophe event. Insurers and reinsurers have been able to push up prices in hurricane-prone areas, by an average of 8% on property insurance. Other lines of business to record price rises include trade credit insurance, where concerns over firms' ability to pay in the current economic climate have boosted premiums by between 20% and 30%.

France-based CNP Assurances has been downgraded to double A minus from double A by rating agency Standard & Poor's. The insurer was said by S&P to be "unlikely to improve its capital adequacy to levels consistent with a rating in the 'AA' category over the next two years. The outlook is stable. S&P analyst Virginie Crepy said that the stable outlook reflected "our belief that CNP will likely continue to maintain a very strong competitive position in the French life insurance market" and that the group "remains well-positioned to capitalize on long-term growth opportunities in the French market". However, S&P expects CNP's new business margins to decline this year, although they are likely to remain above 9.5%. S&P said that a revision on its outlook to positive was not likely over the next couple of years. "Conversely, we could revise the outlook to negative if CNP's financial profile further deteriorates, for example through worsening capital adequacy or a deterioration in underlying earnings beyond our expectations, with a new business margin of less than 9.5% in 2009".

Bermuda-based specialty insurer Torus has launched Torus (Bermuda) Services Ltd, a Managing General Agent for Torus Insurance (UK). Torus said that the new MGA would "develop and promote new casualty products for the local market and provide increased flexibility for clients and brokers when placing casualty business with its Bermuda underwriting platform". Lane Schaffer will be SVP for Torus (Bermuda) Services, reporting directly to David Perez, Chief Underwriting Officer of Global Casualty and President of Torus (Bermuda) Services Ltd. Mr Schaffer joins from AIG. Torus has also expanded its global casualty team with the appointment of Mark St Aoro as Global Casualty Product Line Executive, a newly created position. Mr St Aoro will be "responsible for ensuring underwriting consistency and quality across the Torus casualty platforms worldwide". He will also oversee the development of new products and IT infrastructure, as well as maintaining internal and regulatory compliance standards. Mr St Aoro joins from CV Starr, having previously worked at Great American Insurance, Chubb and Zurich. In his new position he will be based in New Jersey.

US p/c and life group Hartford Financial Services has named former Bank of America executive Liam McGee as chairman and chief executive to replace Ramani Ayer with effect from October 1. Mr Ayer announced in June that he planned to retire by year-end. Connecticut-based Hartford said that Mr Ayer will stay with the company to help with the transition during October and then retire on November 1. Mr McGee recently left Bank of America, where he last served as president of its consumer and small-business banking operation, overseeing more than 6,100 US branches and nearly 100,000 employees. He comes to Hartford six months after the insurer posted a Q1 loss of $1.2bn and ceased sales of annuities in the Japanese and UK markets, and four months after it accepted $3.4bn under the US government's financial bailout programme. Mr McGee told Reuters that he would immediately move to strengthen Hartford's risk management to "avoid the mistakes of the past".