Mr. Weale: IPC was established back in 1993 by a group of private shareholders led by AIG. And it was started following a series of catastrophic events that hit the insurance industry over a number of years and really culminated in Hurricane Andrew in 1992. We are very much a specialist company that was set up to focus on property catastrophe reinsurance, which is, in effect, the insurance of insurance companies, and we protect insurance companies financially from the impact of catastrophes of various kinds, which could include hurricanes, earthquakes, terrorist events, hail, flood, you name it ' we cover most of those events. The company was taken public in 1996 when most of the original founding shareholders with the exception of AIG and General Re, which is now a part of Berkshire Hathaway, sold their interests. The company was, as I say, set up to focus very much on a specialized area like property catastrophe reinsurance on an excess of loss basis. We have tried to ensure that we do this with the best geographic diversification on the basis that obviously one hopes that there aren't multiple events hitting multiple parts of the world at the same time. We do have very disciplined risk and exposure management techniques, and we are very much committed to ensuring that the company has a high quality balance sheet which will enable it to get through the difficult times when large catastrophes occur. The property cat reinsurance market is a very interesting place to be right now, generally as a result of the four hurricanes that hit Florida back in 2004 and then of course we had Hurricane Katrina together with Hurricanes Rita and Wilma last year, and as a result of all of those events, pricing and terms and conditions, especially for US catastrophe risks, are the best that they have been probably since the time of our formation. And we certainly expect those conditions to continue through at least 2007, irrespective of what happens even during the current hurricane season. I guess outside of the US, we are seeing less robust conditions because there is greater price competition. There needs to be a better reflection of the fact that the risks we are taking are on a worldwide basis and not just on localized areas of either the US or Europe. So that's a very brief synopsis of the company and what we do.
Tickers included in this excerpt: IPCR
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