In the latest of Aon’s series of fireside chats with industry experts and leaders, Global Chairman of the broker’s Reinsurance Solutions division, Dominic Christian, spoke with Lloyd’s CEO Neal.
The discussion explored the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic on the Lloyd’s market’s operations, alongside the continuous efforts to develop the right culture and talent, as well as its mission to improve performance and sustainability.
“We’ve been trying to get the market back into shape, fit for purpose, actually. And, I think we’ve been trying to get the market fit for now. This is the reason that we’ve been so heavily focused on getting performance right,” said Neal.
According to the CEO, the world changed forever with the 2008 global financial crisis and the reality is that the market was slow to adjust to the new normal of the lower for longer interest rate environment.
“So, we had to think very differently about the product service and the price of that product, and at Lloyds we had to get ourselves back into where we perhaps should have been four or five years ago.
“I genuinely think through this year-end and through the work we’ve done in 2018, 2019 and 2020, we’re there. And, that’s about setting the market up for sustainable, long-term profitability. If you’re profitable and successful you can be innovative, you can be experimental and you can have the confidence to design new products and services, so it’s not one dimensional,” he continued.
Neal told the audience that at the moment, the marketplace is in “the heat of battle” with the signing off of new business plans. Adding that in his view, the market will grow by the order of 12% to 13% next year.
“So, we’ll be signing off plans that will allow the market to write about $15 billion of new business in 2021. And I think happy to do so, happy that we’re confident that the market’s on track to perform in line with expectation and therefore can grow in two ways – one, price is clearly going up and two, we can actually allow some growth in exposure,” said Neal.