French reinsurers stand out

Despite its resilient performance, Scor did not return any capital to shareholders. Chief financial officer Paolo de Martin commented that with the benefit of hindsight, share repurchases did not seem such a good idea for many companies. Scor has been rewarded for its conservatism with a rating upgrade to A from A- by Standard & Poor’s . Chief executive, Denis Kessler said the reinsurer aimed to offer “an A+ level of security” by 2010

If capital preservation is to be the yardstick for measuring success in 2008, for European reinsurers it seems that the less they had to begin with, the more likely they were to hold on to it. In this respect, Paris Re and, to a lesser extent, Scor performed more impressively than Munich Re or Swiss Re.