BERRIMAN AND OTHERS V ROSE THOMSON YOUNG (UNDERWRITING) LTD

(1996) 5 Re LR 117

Queen’s Bench Division Commercial Court

The Hon Mr Justice Morison Dates of judgment: November 14 -

Lloyd’s litigation - Managing agents - LMX business - Whether underwriter assumed greatly excessive aggregate liabilities and took out too little vertical reinsurance - Whether underwriter was negligent in writing personal stop loss (“PSL”) reinsurance and failing to have matching reinstatements - Whether underwriter fell below standards to be expected of any underwriter who specialised in market - Liability of managing agents to names - Whether names entitled to be put into same position they would have been in if competent underwriter had competently chosen PML (probable maximum loss) event, competently calculated PNE exposure, competently decided how much of that exposure to retain net for names account, and then purchased vertical reinsurance for balance of exposure - Causation - Estoppel.