Canopius promotes Stephen Pike to head up credit and political risk

Canopius has named Stephen Pike as head of its credit and political risk team, within the credit, political and crisis division. He was previously an underwriter of credit and political risk.

Pike joined Canopius in 2017 from ED&F Man Capital Markets where he helped build the global trade finance business. He began his career at Merrill Lynch, focussing on M&A and then leveraged finance, before moving to a special-situations hedge fund where he traded corporate debt, restructured businesses and managed those businesses to growth.

Pike reports to Bernie de Haldevang, who oversees CPR as the overall head of the credit, political & crisis division.

The company said that his appointment underlines Canopius’ commitment to credit and political risk as a key area of focus for the group, which following its 2019 merger with AmTrust, has one of the largest teams in the Lloyd’s market.

de Haldevang highlighted the unparalleled prospects emerging in the post-COVID era. “Becoming one of the younger team leaders in the market to lead a team of this size, [Pike] has made a remarkably fast and effective transition from banker to insurer and is able to leverage his experience in banking and capital markets to the mutual advantage of our clients and ourselves. This underlines our preferred approach of supporting and developing subject matter experts, and working with them to shape the client proposition, as they naturally better understand the clients we aim to serve.”

Pike added: “Financial instability throughout the corporate environment due to the COVID-19 induced recession will increase demand from our clients. As we saw following the last financial crisis, this increased appetite will provide opportunities to those underwriters who are able to offer clear solutions in an uncertain market.”