Reinsurance Focus

In this case, plaintiffs sought leave to renew their motion to dismiss certain retention-related and assignment affirmative defenses based on provisions of certain Loss Portfolio Transfer (LPT) agreements, and to re-argue the motion to dismiss based on their contention that the court: (1) overlooked arguments raised by the parties; (2) determined issues sua sponte without factual and legal support; and (3) misapplied precedent to the undisputed facts at issue.  The court denied plaintiffs’ motions.  The court determined that plaintiffs had failed to refute defendant’s assertion that the LPT may have transferred all of the plaintiffs’ relevant interests and constituted an impermissible assignment because plaintiffs failed to provide documentation showing that the cap in the LPT agreements could be exceeded.  The court also decided that plaintiffs failed to meet their burden of showing that the defendant’s retention defenses were without merit as a matter of law.  The court determined that the LPT did not satisfy the definition of treaty insurance because it was not obtained in advance of coverage. Furthermore, the court determined that the parties’ statements concerning the extent of plaintiffs’ assignment of their interests in the insurance certificates in question were not fatal to defendant’s assignment defenses as a whole.  Granite State Ins. Co. v. Transatlantic Reinsurance Co., Index No. 652506/2012 (Sup. Ct of N.Y., County of N.Y. June 18, 2014).

This post written by Kelly A. Cruz-Brown.

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