For five days in early September, we had the privilege of attending the Monte Carlo Rendez-vous de Septembre, or RVS as it is known, the global reinsurance conference that has been going for more than half a century.

We gathered both market insights from the more than 3,000 delegates from across the industry and discovered some culinary treasures we felt worth sharing.

The industry takeaways

One of the themes of the conference was that the fundamentals underpinning the reinsurance and insurance market continue to remain strong despite softening rates. The market has achieved what participants described as finding the right balance between profitability and growth, with combined ratios remaining in the 80s and 90s overall (Lloyd’s 92.5% in H1), keeping profitability high and supporting continued capital inflows.

M&A momentum has picked up again, with Aspen-Sompo just one among recent deals, and there is talk of more to come. The Skyward-Apollo news came just in time for the RVS and made waves.

On a more specialist note, the legacy market had a visible presence, and speakers at the IRLA panel on Tuesday noted the increased use of legacy solutions to provide finality ahead of M&A deals. Similar chatter abounded at the AIRROC reception.

At Lloyd’s, capacity growth is evident through new syndicates and pre-emptions, with Ariel Re’s launch and rumours published by the Insider of Generali exploring entry. The rise of institutional sidecar syndicates is a particularly interesting development and a structure which many believe we will see more of.

Institutional investors move slowly and only once they’ve seen a track record of positive returns; that is why the new institutional capital can sometimes accelerate softening cycles. After a few years of significant profits, investor appetite is intense.

Institutional capital is now flowing into traditional reinsurance, ILS, cat bonds and new vehicles like London Bridge 2. Higher than previous cat bond issuance highlights the trend. However, as always, the additional capital appetite entry causing a softening market remains fragile and skittish: one outsized or two large events could scare it away.

As a reinsurance broker first pointed out to us, if there is any significant (ie non-attritional) natural catastrophe event, it could cause a capacity squeeze that would likely first appear in the retrocession market.

In short, a quiet hurricane season has helped maintain soft conditions, with even large losses like the California wildfires failing to move rates meaningfully. Fundamentals remain attractive, underpinned by strong capital interest and evolving market structures.

The personal takeaways (including our restaurant recommendations)

Beausoleil is fantastic for food. We particularly enjoyed Aux saveurs des Iles, a Mauritian restaurant serving traditional fare in generous portions.

Braza’s, a cheerful Brazilian, Portuguese and Italian venue in Beausoleil, serves decent cod croquettes and very good picanha. Worth the trip up the escalators if you have time for a nice lunch.

The pizza at Cooks Monaco is exceptional. It is a tiny place near the Novotel and exceptionally reasonable for a venue in Monaco. A caprese salad and pizza easily fed two.

Tip Top Café is a great venue near the RVS itself. We encountered multiple clients and journalists walking past just by sitting at a table outside: the meals of choice were escargots and pizza.

Another decent spot for people watching and just letting the lunchtime go by, with the benefit of being near the Café de Paris – but not at Café de Paris prices – is the Casa del Café on the Avenue de la Costa.

And finally, we had some lovely homemade quiche at the Park Palace Café on the final day – and the staff took very kindly to us spending a long afternoon on our laptops.

In conclusion…

The annual gathering of the industry in Monaco sets the tone for arguably the most important quarter of the year for market participants, Q4, during which reinsurance renewals for the 1^st of January are negotiated. The success of renewals will largely depend on loss experience in the final months of 2025, with most executives acknowledging that a major catastrophe event could change the trajectory of expected rate declines. Industry participants stressed the importance of maintaining underwriting discipline while meeting client needs for growth and innovation.

For us at Tavistock, the RVS was hugely enjoyable. We loved the atmosphere, the long hours and the opportunity to see many of our industry partners in one spot – on the Mediterranean coast. We loved finding unusual food spots. We are already looking forward to next year.

– Kuba Stawiski, director, and Katie Hopkins, associate director, members of Tavistock’s Financial Services Team