ACE completes deal for Rain and Hail Insurance with $1.1 billion transaction

The board of ACE Ltd. announced it has completed its acquisition of Rain and Hail Insurance Service Inc. for approximately $1.1 billion in cash.

The purchase price reflects a dollar for dollar adjustment as required under the merger agreement to account for an increase to Rain and Hail’s book value that occurred between December 31, 2009, and the closing of the transaction.

“We are pleased to now officially welcome this fine organization to ACE,” said Evan G. Greenberg, chairman and CEO of ACE Limited.

“We look forward to the benefits that the combination of our two organizations will bring both in the near and longer term.”

Ward to speak at Merrill Lynch Reinsurance Conference

Validus Holdings, Ltd. announced that Conan M. Ward, CEO of Validus Reinsurance, Ltd., is scheduled to participate in the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Reinsurance Renewal Conference Call on Tuesday, January 4 at 11am Bermuda Time.

The conference call may be accessed by dialing 1-888-686-9679 (U.S. callers) or 1-913-312-1499 (International callers) and entering the passcode 1932141#.

Those who intend to participate in the call should dial in at least 10 minutes in advance. A replay of the call will be available through January 11, 2011 by dialing 1-888-203-1112 (U.S. callers) or 1-719-457-0820 (International callers) and entering the passcode 1932141#.

AmerInst affirmed by Best

A.M. Best Co. has affirmed the financial strength rating of A- (Excellent) and issuer credit rating of “a-” of AmerInst Insurance Group, Ltd (AmerInst) (Hamilton, Bermuda). The outlook for both ratings is stable.

The ratings reflect AmerInst’s strong capitalization and its experienced management team as well as the company’s niche expertise as a reinsurer of professional liability policies. Partially offsetting these positive rating factors is AmerInst’s narrow spread of underwriting risk, in addition to the execution risk associated with the implementation of the new business plan.

AmerInst intends to continue under its new business plan to employ a conservative reserving methodology under which it had historically booked to a higher loss ratio than that of its primary carrier.

AmerInst has met A.M. Best’s higher capitalization requirements, which mandate a more conservative level of risk-based capital for a new business plan.