Pine Walk’s Silverflame Re targets $50mn GWP in first year

Pine Walk’s newly launched specialty reinsurance cell Silverflame Re is targeting $50mn in gross written premiums in its first year, with the Fidelis Partnership-backed entity set to enter the tight marine retrocession market, The Insurer can reveal.

Sources said the $50mn target would be split 60-40 between marine and energy reinsurance and trade credit reinsurance.

The marine and energy book will include marine retrocession, sources said. It is unclear exactly what proportion of the marine portfolio will focus on retro, but sources said it could be as much as 50 percent.

Silverflame Re’s marine retro entry follows a major tightening of capacity in the segment, in contrast to the wider marine reinsurance market.

One factor that drove this tightening, sources said, was Tamesis Dual’s inability to find replacement capacity at 1 April 2024. The firm is understood to now only be writing on Tokio Marine Kiln paper.

Marine reinsurance broking sources told this publication that the retro market is very well priced at present, with little upwards room on rating and a good return for those involved in recent years. One source said that the marine retro market has achieved loss ratios of ~22 percent over the past decade.

Silverflame Re launched on 1 October in a move first revealed by The Insurer.

The cell is led by former Tamesis Dual underwriter Jenan Nakeeb as lead underwriter, with Aegis London’s Elizabeth Powell set to join the cell as managing director on 2 December.

In its announcement confirming the launch, Pine Walk said Silverflame Re would write a treaty portfolio initially focused on marine, energy and composite, as well as credit and surety.

Silverflame Re marked the eleventh MGA established on the Pine Walk platform. In September the platform launched international property-focused Seraphina, led by former Probitas 1492 senior underwriter Kelly Sanders as founder and chief underwriting officer.

The $50mn GWP from Silverflame Re will bolster Pine Walk’s goal to surpass $1bn in GWP in 2025. Fidelis Partnership’s in-house MGA platform wrote $780mn in gross premiums last year, an increase of 43 percent on the prior year.

Fidelis Partnership and Pine Walk declined to comment.