A.M. Best Updates Property/Casualty Supplemental Rating Questionnaire

A.M. Best Co. has updated its 2013 statement year "Property/Casualty Supplemental Rating Questionnaire" (SRQ) in several key areas. The areas affected include Interest Rate Sensitivity, Fixed Income Portfolio Analysis, Common Stock Portfolio Analysis, Products, Terrorism Death Benefit Tables and Enterprise Risk Management (ERM).

Expansion of the interest rate sensitivity analysis will allow for review of the impact of larger interest rate changes on fixed income portfolios. Additional information requesting the number of issuers regarding the rating and maturity distribution of bonds will assist in the analysis of asset risk. The addition of common stock portfolio analysis requesting Beta and "R-Squared" data for publicly traded common stock holdings will allow for greater levels of detail in the analysis of a rating unit's exposure to stock price volatility. Inclusion of premium written in other countries will assist in the application of country risk analysis. Changes to the death benefit tables in the terrorism section were made to reflect the most recent available benefit information by state. Elimination of questions regarding asbestos, pollution and other mass tort exposures will streamline the process for completion of the SRQ. Elimination of the Enterprise Risk Management section allows the SRQ to focus on objective financial results for rating entities. Information about a rating unit's ERM will be gathered in other areas of the interactive rating process. A rating unit's consolidated surplus should be entered into the SRQ in ($000s) to help reduce the amount of manual input into the SRQ for those questions that request a ratio to surplus.

This press release will allow sufficient time for companies to compile and provide the new requested information.

A.M. Best continues to put a high degree of emphasis on an organization's overall catastrophe management and the impact on its financial strength. For those companies that use multiple catastrophe models as part of their risk management, the SRQ requests the output from each model separately. All insurers are requested to provide their view of their catastrophe risk regardless of how many models they use, since their view of risk may be different than the model output. All catastrophe loss estimates are expected to be based on the rating unit's worldwide exposures.

A copy of the new and revised property/casualty questions can be accessed at http://www3.ambest.com/ratings/default.asp.

A.M. Best Company is the world's oldest and most authoritative insurance rating and information source. For more information, visit www.ambest.com.

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A.M. Best Company
Robert Raber, 908-439-2200, ext. 5696
Senior Financial Analyst
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Thomas Mount, 908-439-2200, ext. 5155
Vice President
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Senior Manager, Public Relations
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Jim Peavy, 908-439-2200, ext. 5644
Assistant Vice President, Public Relations
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