By Chris Munro

May 9 - (The Insurer) - International General Insurance Holdings has embarked on “a real push” to expand its specialty reinsurance book with growth in the sector behind much of its gross premium written (GPW) increase in Q1 2025, group president and CEO Waleed Jabsheh told The Insurer.

The Bermuda-based (re)insurer booked $206.5 million of GPW in 2025’s first quarter, up 13.7% from the prior-year period.

A lot of that growth was within IGI’s reinsurance segment where GPW increased to $70.0 million from Q1 2024’s $48.7 million, and that expansion largely came from greater specialty writings, Jabsheh explained.

The executive said IGI has historically been “very light” in the specialty reinsurance segment.

However, starting in the second half of last year, Jabsheh said IGI has gone on “a real push” to expand in the segment.

As Jabsheh explained, a significant amount of specialty reinsurance business renews at January 1, and he said IGI was “able to capture a lot of that.”

Going forward, Jabsheh said IGI is growing its specialty reinsurance team.

“It's really all hands-on deck on the reinsurance side for us, at least for now,” he said.

“Yes, the market is softening, but it’s still in very rate adequate territory and it's an area where we've always been probably underweight in, but the timing over the last couple of years (has been good for us to grow in).

“In 2022 our portfolio was $30 million, (and) this year, we'll probably be upwards of $100 million, so we really have put a concerted effort in capitalizing on the healthy reinsurance market.”

Currently, IGI’s reinsurance book is split approximately 30% specialty and the remainder a mixture of property risk business and catastrophe.

The specialty reinsurance portfolio “is a broad book”, said Jabsheh, with standard marine business, along with energy, political violence, terrorism and some cyber.

“It's quite a diversified book of business, and this area is where we've been underweight and almost non-existent for the last couple of years, really, within our reinsurance portfolio, and we’re finding good opportunities there,” said Jabsheh.