June 11, 2026

W.R. Berkley Corp. said its founder and executive chairman William R. Berkley died on June 9, 2026 at age 80, and that his son W. Robert Berkley Jr. was named chairman effective immediately, after a year of record earnings.

AM Best says the US directors and officers liability line posted a fourth year of premium decline in 2025 while its direct loss ratio rose five points to 54.5 and reserves for accident years 2023 and 2024 proved inadequate.

S&P Global Market Intelligence data reported in Risk & Insurance on May 27, 2026 show US property and casualty insurers earned a net underwriting gain of $22.10 billion in the first quarter at an 89.5% combined ratio before policyholder dividends, the seventh straight quarter below 100%, while other liability and commercial auto liability deteriorated.

Howard Hughes Holdings closed its roughly $2.1 billion all-cash acquisition of Bermuda-based specialty insurer Vantage on June 4, 2026, funded by cash and $1 billion of preferred stock issued to Pershing Square Holdings, with Pershing Square managing the investments fee-free.

Acrisure CEO Greg Williams told staff on May 20 that about 2,250 jobs, around 11% of the company's roughly 19,000 employees, would go by the end of 2027, citing AI and digital platforms, following 400 accounting job cuts announced in October 2025.

Guy Carpenter says June 2026 Florida property-catastrophe reinsurance prices fell by roughly 15% to 20% risk-adjusted as demand rose 12%, helped by a 76.8% combined ratio in 2025, 45% higher policyholder surplus and tort reform.

An ECB illustrative stress test of a severe private credit shock found insurers faced the largest absolute impact and pension funds the largest losses against assets, while banks' losses stayed within 1.3% of equity; euro area insurers held about €211 billion of private credit, 2.3% of their assets, and the ESAs' September 2026 update says insurers' exposures are limited in aggregate but warrant attention.

Merck will pay more than $50 million, according to people familiar with the matter, to settle more than 200 dismissed North Carolina cases and a Los Angeles case set for trial, ending Gardasil litigation apart from one case without admitting liability.

Khaleej Times reports the UAE health and medical insurance segment is projected at about $10.11 billion in 2026 and $15.04 billion by 2031, while Gulf News details the Dh320 basic employer-funded cover for private-sector and domestic workers that began on January 1, 2025.

S&P Global estimates Progressive passed State Farm as the largest US private auto insurer in the 12 months to March 2026 by more than $1.57 billion, but AM Best's 2025 ranking of all property and casualty lines still has State Farm first at $113.8 billion.

A Triple-I and Milliman briefing projects US property and casualty underlying growth of -3.7% in the first half of 2026, down from 1.6% in 2025, with recovery expected in 2027 and 2028 even as 2025 combined ratios were the lowest in over a decade.

Artemis data published on July 6, 2026 show catastrophe bond issuance reached almost $17.98 billion in the first half of 2026, a record above the $17.56 billion of the first half of 2025, with May the biggest single month ever at almost $6.93 billion and the outstanding market at a record almost $65.6 billion.