***fireworks soon***********, page-4

Unfortunately not nonsense but fact, see the reference to SUN and evidence from its main competitor IAG, see below. SUN Ex-Directors like Cameron are selling out again, see below: The only Director signing up for SUN is the Federal Police investigated Elmer Funke-Kupper. That tarnishes SUN's reputation and call its question its governance, risk and compliance, again please see below:

Insurer IAG is on track to blow its natural perils allowance for the second year in a row due to the catastrophic bushfires, which have so far resulted in 2800 claims from customers

.In a statement on Friday, IAG said the bushfires had already cost the firm about $160 million, bringing its total net losses from natural perils for the first half of the 2020 financial year to $400 million.

IAG estimates the bushfires have so far cost it $160 million, bringing its total natural perils bill for the financial year to $400 million. Nowa Nowa General StoreThat was $80 million more than its six-month allowance of $320 million, and means IAG has only $221 million set aside for the remainder of the financial year.

If it exceeds that allowance, it will have blown its net perils allowance in 12 out of the past 15 years, despite upping it for the 2020 financial year to meet the increasing risks posed by extreme weather.IAG, whose brands include NRMA Insurance, CGU Insurance, RACV and WFI, said the majority of bushfire-related claims were on residential properties. The company did not make any change to its earning guidance, and there was little movement in the share price following the announcement.

General insurers such as IAG, Suncorp and QBE have struggled in recent years to estimate the reserves needed to fund increasingly unpredictable and costly extreme weather events.Last year, IAG blew its natural perils allowance by $84 million, while Suncorp blew its by $129 million. Hailstorms in Sydney and flooding in Townsville were the biggest costs. The year before, extreme weather events around the world saw QBE post a $US1.2 billion loss.Research by IAG, published in November, found hail, flooding and bushfires were all becoming more common as a result of climate change.Announcing the firm's full year results in August, IAG's chief financial officer Nick Hawkins admitted the company was struggling to accurately price the risk of natural perils."Are we seeing increased frequency and severity of weather-type events across the years? Yes. Do we think that we in the industry have underpriced the perils exposure that are impacting our customers? Probably. And that’s the challenge we have running our business. We’re trying to manage that," he said.Claims expected to keep rising

Luke Gallagher, IAG executive general manager of short tail claims, said:"We’re urging our customers to get in contact with us as soon as possible to make a claim so we can provide immediate support, such as emergency accommodation and financial assistance.“Our disaster response customer support program is also available where customers can receive free and confidential counselling by a team of psychologists experienced in providing post-incident support.“Our major events claims team, including our assessors and builders, will be on the ground to help our customers once it is safe to enter the affected areas."A spokesperson for Suncorp, the other major home insurer, said the company expected to update the market on losses from the bushfires next week.The Insurance Council of Australia said Australian insurers had, as of Friday, received a total of 5250 claims as a result of the bushfires, representing $321 million in insurance losses. With fires still raging across the country, those figures were expected to keep rising.The figures do not include uninsured losses, which the ICA said are likely to be particularly significant in New South Wales, where there are higher rates of underinsurance than the national average.The ICA linked this to NSW charging insurers a special levy to fund emergency services in the state. It argued this pushed up premiums and encouraged under- and non-insurance.

IAG revealed on Friday that it had upped its reinsurance by $1 billion for the 2020 financial year. It is now covered for major natural disasters to a value of up to $10 billion, of which it must pay the first $250 million.A spokeswoman said the decision to up reinsurance cover did not have anything to do with climate-change-related natural catastrophes, which, though becoming more frequent and costly, are unlikely to cost anything like $10 billion. The only single events likely to cause that amount of damage are earthquakes, the spokeswoman said.

When Michael Cameron suddenly departed as chief executive of Suncorp in May last year, he said the insurance-banking giant “has great potential and will continue to enjoy success”.Three months later, as the ASX 20 company changed strategy, he looks to have offloaded his whole $4 million shareholding in Suncorp.

Former Suncorp chief executive Michael Cameron. Dominic Lorrimer“In relation to any sale of shares, transactions will reflect the rebalancing of my investment portfolio,” Mr Cameron told The Australian Financial Review.Mr Cameron, 59, still retains potential bonus equity in Brisbane-based Suncorp. But it’s uncertain how much of that will convert into real shares; a large proportion of his bonus equity in recent years has been forfeited because Suncorp missed performance targets.Mr Cameron was chief executive between October 2015 and May 2019. He departed amid controversy about his “Marketplace” strategy to create a digital finance zone akin to an Amazon of financial marketplaces.R

The company under new chief executive Steve Johnston has since rejigged strategy, saying it had lost focus on its core business. First Mr Cameron’s “Marketplace” pitch has been largely junked and attention is being refocused on areas such as insurance brands and simplifying executive responsibilities.Mr Cameron’s resignation in May included an ASX-filing that he had 297,662 Suncorp shares in his name and that of his private company, Always Turn Left. He remained as a consultant until August 9 last year.

But a search by the Financial Review of Suncorp’s share registry showed Mr Cameron ceased holding any shares in either his name or Always Turn Left in the weeks after he finished as a consultant. Share prices around that time were between the mid $13 and low $14 mark, indicating he could have received roughly $4 million for his equity.Mr Cameron, who recently took a position as chairman of Adelaide-based People’s Choice Credit Union, declined interview requests or to comment on specific numbers. But he said via text message that any sale would indicate a diversification of his investment portfolio.Sales do not mean Mr Cameron has no future exposure to Suncorp’s fortunes. When he departed in May, Mr Cameron also retained almost 480,000 in potential long-term bonus shares, called performance rights, and 109,000 in deferred short-term bonus shares. They were built up between 2016 and 2018.But the whole allocation of 2016’s tranche of 235,000 performance rights failed to clear their target in August last year and were forfeited.The remaining 245,000 performance rights depend on Suncorp hitting targets in 2020 and 2021. Those targets require Suncorp’s total shareholder return – tracking both dividends and share price changes – over three years to be in the top half of 50 top companies before the performance rights start turning into shares.History shows hitting such targets has been a tough slog: long-term potential bonus shares have been forfeited for the past three years.

Suncorp’s share price is now trading around the low $13, high $12 mark. Its last full-year earnings results for fiscal 2019, released in August, showed cash profits had risen 1.5 per cent to $1.115 billion.The company in November also provided an update on the insurance and banking businesses, which was fairly well received by analysts. While lending volumes had fallen 0.6 per cent to $59 billion, UBS analysts led by Kieren Chidgey said a stable outlook for margins and a benign level of bad debts should “provide support” for Suncorp’s banking arm.Citigroup analysts led by Nigel Pittaway said that while Suncorp had been “flagging a tough banking market … market fears of a significant downgrade were not forthcoming”.The underlying operating conditions for its general insurance arm seemed favourable, the analysts said.

Suncorp was seeing “positive early signs of volume improvement in personal [insurance] lines” and premium rate increases should continue. “However, Suncorp has a fair number of headwinds to reprice for, including lower yields, higher hazards allowance … regulatory costs and some increases in home claims inflation,” the analysts said.The company also in December appointed Lee Hatton, head of NAB’s online lender UBank, as the incoming head of Suncorp’s banking arm. Jeremy Robson has also been confirmed as permanent chief financial officer.Elmer Funke Kupper was also named as a new Suncorp director, marking a new beginning for the former ASX and Tabcorp chief executive after the Australian Federal Police in September last year said it would drop a foreign bribery probe.The AFP had been investigating a payment from gaming giant Tabcorp, when Mr Funke Kupper had been chief executive, in relation to a Cambodian business. Mr Funke Kupper had maintained he had done nothing wrong.