Banks raise the stakes for non-life, as well as life, market share

During the 1980s Finnish insurers wrote a sizeable amount of international reinsurance and retrocession including LMX business. The various losses from numerous man-made and natural catastrophes, exacerbated by the London market spiral, hit all companies writing reinsurance. The experience has left the market chastened and still nursing its run-off portfolios

In 2007 there were 24 non-life insurers (and reinsurers in run-off) in Finland. The latter figure includes the branch operations of foreign insurers in Finland. In addition there were around 20 representative offices and 96 small, local insurance mutuals. In addition 385 companies have reported their intention to write non-life Finnish business on a cross-border basis. How many of these have actually written any Finnish business is not known, but branches write less than 4% of premium.