CINCINNATI, Nov. 4, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Cincinnati Financial
Corporation (Nasdaq: CINF) today announced that its London-based global specialty underwriting
subsidiary, Cincinnati Global Underwriting Ltd.â„¢, will begin
writing two new lines of business: Contingency and Specie.
Contingency insurance covers film and entertainment risks, such
as: insuring film and TV production for their props, sets, wardrobe
and filming equipment; providing peace of mind that productions are
completed within budget and delivered on time; and offering event
cancellation for tradeshows, conferences, exhibitions, sporting
events, theatrical performances, concerts and music festivals.
A Specie portfolio includes coverage for theft or loss of
high-value portable property including fine art, jewelry, gold
bullion and cash in transit.
Francis Hernandez joined
Cincinnati Global as Head of Contingency on November 2. Hernandez began working in the
insurance industry in 1988, specializing in Contingency since 1993.
He has experience building profitable portfolios of entertainment
business as an underwriter and a broker. Hernandez most recently
headed Chubb's successful International Film & Entertainment
Division.
Ian Seakens will also be joining Cincinnati Global as Head of
Specie in early 2021. He brings with him 35 years of industry
experience in Specie and Specialty Lines insurance. Seakens joins
from AEGIS London where he worked for the last 10 years building an
excellent reputation as a lead underwriter in the London market. Until Seakens joins the
company, the Specie portfolio will be run by experienced
underwriter Charlotte McIntyre, who
also recently joined the Cincinnati Global team from AEGIS
London.
Cincinnati Global Director of Corporate Development Kevin Timmons stated: "We are delighted that
Frankie, Ian and Charlotte are joining our expanding team. We have
identified Contingency and Specie as historically profitable
classes of business through which we can grow and provide excellent
service to clients and brokers. Following CGU's acquisition by
Cincinnati Financial Corporation, we announced our intention to
diversify our underwriting through the addition of new specialty
classes of business. We believe Frankie and Ian's lead underwriting
capability will enable us to meet these objectives and facilitate
future profitable growth."
About Cincinnati Financial
Cincinnati Financial Corporation offers primarily business, home
and auto insurance through The Cincinnati Insurance Company
and its two standard market property casualty companies. The same
local independent insurance agencies that market those policies may
offer products of our other subsidiaries, including life insurance,
fixed annuities and surplus lines property and casualty insurance.
For additional information about the company, please visit
cinfin.com.
Mailing
Address:
|
Street
Address:
|
P.O. Box
145496
|
6200 South Gilmore
Road
|
Cincinnati, Ohio
45250-5496
|
Fairfield, Ohio
45014-5141
|
Safe Harbor
This is our "Safe Harbor" statement under the Private Securities
Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Our business is subject to certain
risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ
materially from those suggested by the forward-looking statements
in this report. Some of those risks and uncertainties are discussed
in our 2019 Annual Report on Form 10-K, Item 1A, Risk Factors,
Page 35 and Item 1A, Risk Factors in our subsequent Quarterly
Reports on Form 10-Q.
Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences
include, but are not limited to:
- Effects of the COVID-19 pandemic that could affect results for
reasons such as:
-
- Securities market disruption or volatility and related effects
such as decreased economic activity that affect the company's
investment portfolio and book value
- An unusually high level of claims in our insurance or
reinsurance operations that increase litigation-related
expenses
- An unusually high level of insurance losses, including risk of
legislation or court decisions extending business interruption
insurance in commercial property coverage forms to cover claims for
pure economic loss related to the COVID-19 pandemic
- Decreased premium revenue and cash flow from disruption to our
distribution channel of independent agents, consumer
self-isolation, travel limitations, business restrictions and
decreased economic activity
- Inability of our workforce, agencies or vendors to perform
necessary business functions
- Unusually high levels of catastrophe losses due to
risk concentrations, changes in weather patterns,
environmental events, terrorism incidents or other causes
- Increased frequency and/or severity of claims or development of
claims that are unforeseen at the time of policy issuance
- Inadequate estimates, assumptions or reliance on third-party
data used for critical accounting estimates
- Declines in overall stock market values negatively affecting
the company's equity portfolio and book value
- Prolonged low interest rate environment or other factors that
limit the company's ability to generate growth in investment income
or interest rate fluctuations that result in declining values of
fixed-maturity investments, including declines in accounts in which
we hold bank-owned life insurance contract assets
- Domestic and global events resulting in capital market or
credit market uncertainty, followed by prolonged periods of
economic instability or recession, that lead to:
-
- Significant or prolonged decline in the fair value of a
particular security or group of securities and impairment of
the asset(s)
- Significant decline in investment income due to reduced or
eliminated dividend payouts from a particular security or group of
securities
- Significant rise in losses from surety and director and officer
policies written for financial institutions or other
insured entities
- Our inability to integrate Cincinnati Global and its
subsidiaries into our on-going operations, or disruptions to our
on-going operations due to such integration
- Recession or other economic conditions resulting in lower
demand for insurance products or increased
payment delinquencies
- Difficulties with technology or data security breaches,
including cyberattacks, that could negatively affect our ability to
conduct business; disrupt our relationships with agents,
policyholders and others; cause reputational damage, mitigation
expenses and data loss and expose us to liability under federal and
state laws
- Disruption of the insurance market caused by technology
innovations such as driverless cars that could decrease consumer
demand for insurance products
- Delays, inadequate data developed internally or from third
parties, or performance inadequacies from ongoing development and
implementation of underwriting and pricing methods, including
telematics and other usage-based insurance methods, or technology
projects and enhancements expected to increase our pricing
accuracy, underwriting profit and competitiveness
- Increased competition that could result in a significant
reduction in the company's premium volume
- Changing consumer insurance-buying habits and consolidation of
independent insurance agencies that could alter our competitive
advantages
- Inability to obtain adequate ceded reinsurance on acceptable
terms, amount of reinsurance coverage purchased, financial strength
of reinsurers and the potential for nonpayment or delay in payment
by reinsurers
- Inability to defer policy acquisition costs for any business
segment if pricing and loss trends would lead management
to conclude that segment could not achieve
sustainable profitability
- Inability of our subsidiaries to pay dividends consistent with
current or past levels
- Events or conditions that could weaken or harm the company's
relationships with its independent agencies and hamper
opportunities to add new agencies, resulting in limitations on the
company's opportunities for growth, such as:
-
- Downgrades of the company's financial
strength ratings
- Concerns that doing business with the company is
too difficult
- Perceptions that the company's level of service, particularly
claims service, is no longer a distinguishing characteristic in the
marketplace
- Inability or unwillingness to nimbly develop and introduce
coverage product updates and innovations that our competitors offer
and consumers expect to find in the marketplace
- Actions of insurance departments, state attorneys general or
other regulatory agencies, including a change to a federal system
of regulation from a state-based system, that:
-
- Impose new obligations on us that increase our expenses or
change the assumptions underlying our critical accounting
estimates
- Place the insurance industry under greater regulatory scrutiny
or result in new statutes, rules and regulations
- Restrict our ability to exit or reduce writings of unprofitable
coverages or lines of business
- Add assessments for guaranty funds, other insurance–related
assessments or mandatory reinsurance arrangements; or that impair
our ability to recover such assessments through future surcharges
or other rate changes
- Increase our provision for federal income taxes due to changes
in tax law
- Increase our other expenses
- Limit our ability to set fair, adequate and
reasonable rates
- Place us at a disadvantage in the marketplace
- Restrict our ability to execute our business model, including
the way we compensate agents
- Adverse outcomes from litigation or
administrative proceedings
- Events or actions, including unauthorized intentional
circumvention of controls, that reduce the company's future ability
to maintain effective internal control over financial reporting
under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002
- Unforeseen departure of certain executive officers or other key
employees due to retirement, health or other causes that could
interrupt progress toward important strategic goals or diminish the
effectiveness of certain longstanding relationships with insurance
agents and others
- Events, such as an epidemic, natural catastrophe or terrorism,
that could hamper our ability to assemble our workforce at our
headquarters location
Further, the company's insurance businesses are subject to the
effects of changing social, global, economic and regulatory
environments. Public and regulatory initiatives have included
efforts to adversely influence and restrict premium rates, restrict
the ability to cancel policies, impose underwriting standards and
expand overall regulation. The company also is subject to public
and regulatory initiatives that can affect the market value for its
common stock, such as measures affecting corporate financial
reporting and governance. The ultimate changes and eventual
effects, if any, of these initiatives are uncertain.
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SOURCE Cincinnati Financial Corporation