It was a good year to be in the insurance and reinsurance industries. Swiss Re has released their preliminary assessment of 2006 catastrophe losses which are spectacularly low.

According to one industry official, “will see further rate increases even though 2006 has been a remarkably catastrophe-free year. 2005 was so bad that catastrophe rates must rise further.”

According to our analysis, 2006 ranks 18th in terms of normalized hurricane damage years since 1987. According to Swiss Re, “Among the last 20 years, 2006 has produced the third-lowest insured losses, after 1997 and 1988. This is attributable mainly to the quiet hurricane season in the US and surrounding countries.” But there were remarkably few other disasters as well.