In international aviation reinsurance we similarly rank among the market leaders. Despite the difficult economic climate in Europe and North America, the situation facing airlines continued to stabilise in the year under review. Passenger numbers picked up slightly, which also benefited the (re)insurance industry. With deliveries of new large airliners on the rise, more and more policies are seeing increases in the indemnity limits purchased by airlines.

Primary insurers further raised their retentions on the back of improved capital resources. Although the year under review was notable for a series of basic losses, these did not have any major implications for reinsurers since for the most part they remained within the retentions carried by insurers. For this reason, and on account of further expansion in reinsurance capacities, the pressure on prices intensified in the course of the year under review. With this in mind, our goal was to largely preserve the existing market shares and prices as well as to further diversify our portfolio. We successfully achieved these aims.

We are a market leader for non-proportional treaties in the airline market, whereas in the proportional sector we write our business opportunistically and concentrate primarily on niche segments. We maintained our involvement in non-proportional reinsurance on a stable level. By entering into strategic partnerships we were able to expand our portfolio in aviation reinsurance.

Claims expenditure in the aviation line has benefited from the use of aircraft fitted with state-of-the-art technology. The burden of losses has been below average for three years now. The major loss experience in the year under review proved to be better than expected. The largest single event for our portfolio was a satellite loss, resulting in a net strain of around EUR 9 million for our account.

The combined ratio was virtually unchanged at 81.8% (78.7%).