Mr. Hardy: Syndicate 382, which is the basis of our business, starting trading in 1975. I had been in the market since 1959, taking over from my father as active underwriter in 1970, writing under C. T. Bowring. In 1975 we started this syndicate - 382 - which is the one we're dealing with now, and which originally started as an oil rig specialist syndicate. We write almost no oil rigs now, which shows how our business has changed. In 1995, following losses in the Lloyd's market we believed that the days of the traditional Lloyd's name were numbered. We became frightened, ourselves, with unlimited liability, and it's since then that we've sought to change our capital base from unlimited traditional Lloyd's names into limited corporate names. So in 1995 we set up Hardy Underwriting, which started as a corporate name on the one syndicate. In 1996 we formed Hardy Underwriting Group, which bought that underwriting name and also set up another name, Hardy Names. So our company consists of four companies, basically: HU, which is Hardy Underwriting; HN, which is Hardy Names; the agency which manages the business; and a small service company, Hardy Insurance Services. In 1996 the management, which is employed by the agency company, and the capital were joined together in one company - Hardy Underwriting Group - and that forms 73.5% of the syndicate 382. During that period, we listed first on the AIM market and last year on the main stock market in the UK. Throughout this period we've been trying to encourage our Names, many of whom we know personally, to become shareholders. We did, in fact, do the first scheme at Lloyd's to help Names become shareholders so that they could use their capital - their Lloyd's deposits as Names -twice. That was only partially successful because it was complicated, and it came out at the time when Lloyd's was going through its rescue scheme. So in 1998, in order to effect that purchase of capital from the Names, we raised about GBP18 million at a 250p share price.
Tickers included in this excerpt: HDU.L
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