The puzzle of underwriting cycles and insurance crises in property-liability insurance has led to numerous economic hypotheses and analyses, yet no single theory seems capable of explaining all of its aspects. Reinsurance is hypothesized to be a potential factor in observed cycles in the primary...

This paper examines the relationship between mergers and acquisitions, efficiency, and scale economies in the U.S. life insurance industry. We estimate cost and revenue efficiency over the period 1988-1995 using data envelopment analysis (DEA). The Malmquist methodology is used to measure...

This paper analyzes the efficiency of stock and mutual organizational forms in the property-liability insurance industry using nonparametric frontier efficiency methods. We test the managerial discretion hypothesis, which predicts that the market will sort organizational forms into market...

We use data on U.S. insurance companies to examine the validity of the conglomeration hypothesis versus the strategic focus hypothesis for financial institutions. We distinguish between the hypotheses using profit scope economies, which measures the relative efficiency of joint versus...

type="main" xml:lang="en" <title type="main">Abstract</title> <p>This article uses daily market value data on credit default swap spreads and intraday stock prices to measure systemic risk in the insurance sector. Using the systemic risk measure, we examine the interconnectedness between banks and insurers with Granger...</p>

type="main" xml:lang="en" <title type="main">Abstract</title> <p>This article examines the potential for the U.S. insurance industry to cause systemic risk events that spill over to other segments of the economy. We examine primary indicators of systemic risk as well as contributing factors that exacerbate vulnerability to...</p>

This paper analyzes the characteristics of U.S. insurers for purposes of determining whether they are systemically risky. More specifically, primary factors (size, interconnectedness, and lack of substitutability) and contributing factors (leverage, liquidity risk and maturity mismatch,...

This research analyzes the performance of the Risk Based Capital (RBC) ratio and other variables in predicting insolvencies in the property-liability insurance industry during the period 1994 to 2008. This research contributes to the literature by analyzing a longer period of time than previous...

This study investigates how U.S. property-liability insurers changed their behavior response to the risk-based capital (RBC) requirements implemented in 1994. We posit that We posit that insurers may have acted to manage their operations and/or exploit anomalies in the RBC may have acted to...