Bermuda adds 19 captives in 2018, writes $40bn in premiums

The Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) licensed 19 new captive insurance companies in 2018, bringing the total to 711.

Bermuda also ended 2019 with captive insurance premiums totalling approximately $40 billion.

The number of new formations is slightly up from 2017, where there were 17 formations.

“The majority of the new captives originated from the US, but they also came from Europe, Canada, Latin America and Africa," said Craig Swan, managing director, supervision (insurance), BMA.

Swan added that the captives covered a diverse range of company structure, including pure captives, association (group) captives and long-term captives.

He continued: “In terms of the lines of business being written, there was no one predominant area among the new captives. Instead, there was a good mix of property and casualty classes, including general liability, professional liability, workers compensation and motor.”

However, Bermuda's total active captive re/insurance licenses has been in decline over the last few years. The total number of captives was 739 in 2017, 776 in 2016, and 797 in 2015. A portion of this decline can be attributed to M&A activity and consolidation.