@Risk

Aon Risk Services, the global risk management and insurance brokerage business of Aon Corporation has launched its 17th annual Political Risk Map, and it shows that political and financial instability remain a feature of the business landscape.

There are 18 downgrades in this year’s map, driven mostly by rising risk levels in 2009, which in turn led to a significant volume of credit and political risk claims in international insurance markets.

The 18 countries with worsening conditions are: Algeria, Argentina, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Honduras, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Madagascar, Mauritania, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Seychelles, Sudan, United Arab Emirates, Ukraine, Venezuela and Yemen.

“For instance, non-payment of sovereign and sub-sovereign debt obligations is a major issue for underwriters insuring risks in Ghana, and underwriters continue to experience a multitude of claims stemming from payment defaults by private sector banks in Ukraine,” explains Miles Johnstone, director of Aon’s Political Risk team. (more…)

The top three concerns for retailers today are the recession, damage to reputation, and supply chain disruptions and failures, according to new research by Aon.

Unfortunately, Aon’s “2009 U.S. Retail Industry Report” also found that retailers rank these three concerns as the ones they are least prepared for. Over half of the survey respondents (53%) say they aren’t prepared for supply chain failure or damage to reputation (52%). A third (33%) feel they lack adequate preparedness for the economic slowdown.
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Just last week, I wrote about Aon Corporation’s 2009 Defense Industry Benchmarking Report.

Now, the company is in the news again with the release of its first U.S. Quarterly Market Overview for Property, Casualty, and Directors’ and Officers’ Lines.

Aon, one of the world’s leading providers of risk management services, hopes companies will use trend data identified in the report to support informed decision-making in risk management.

“In this difficult economic climate, it has never been more critical to an organization’s overall health and performance to have an effective risk management program in place,” says Warren Mula, chairman of U.S. retail for Aon Risk Services.

I agree. And, in today’s global, complex, and ultra-competitive marketplace, it’s vital to incorporate the most up-to-date data in your risk management strategies.

Here are a few highlights from the 16-page report:

• Property – Compared to a tumultuous 2008, results for the Property Insurance Market in the first half of 2009 have been mostly positive with higher prices and low losses. According to the report, insureds should expect renewed competition and modest downward pressure on rates into 2010.

• Casualty – Overall, the Soft Casualty Market has experienced rate decreases. The  notable exception here is primary automobile, which saw an increase of <1% in Q2 ’09, the first increase in on any casualty line in several years.  Aon expects Soft Market Casualty conditions to continue in 2010.

• Directors’ and Officers’ Liability – Among financial institutions it has become difficult to place risk, and Aon has seen claims activity and rate increases across all segments. However, D&O liability in all other sectors continues to be competitive, with rates trending down.

The full report is available for download at http://insight.aon.com/?elqPURLPage=4625 (registration required).

On Monday, Aon Corporation, a leading global provider of risk management services, released its 2009 Defense Industry Benchmarking Report.

This annual report addresses the key issues and concerns of defense industry clients and is designed to allow these organizations to benchmark their risk management and risk financing practices against those of their peers and competitors, while identifying practices or approaches that may improve the effectiveness of existing risk management strategies.

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What poses the greatest risk to global supply chains these days? Financial failure.

That’s according to 75% of respondents in a new survey conducted by Aon and State of Flux.

Interestingly, though, only 7% of those polled had actually experienced losses related to financial exposure of suppliers. By contrast, the top reported reasons for supply chain disruptions were physical incidents at own sites (14%) and incidents at suppliers (12%).

Other highlights from the 34-page “2009 Risk in 21st Century Supply Chains” survey include:

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