Our insider has always kept his ear to the ground for juicy insurance gossip, so with the Olympics in full swing he has pulled together a special list of backchats for your perusal

Murray fully covered

I enjoyed watching the dramatic Olympic tennis final between Andy Murray and Roger Federer this weekend, but I nearly choked on my champers when I saw several other insurance heavyweights in the crowd too. As the camera panned across the crowd I saw AXA boss Amanda Blanc, LV= managing director John O’Roarke, LV= operations director Peter Horton and Autoglass director Andre May all cheering Murray’s victory.

Ping pong patron

Patronage from my pal Warren Buffett isn’t handed out lightly, so American Olympic table-tennis hopeful Ariel Hsing can count herself lucky. The Berkshire Hathaway owner was spotted in the crowd last week cheering on Ariel, who is only 16 years old. Warren met Ariel when she was nine, and the two struck up a friendship. She regularly plays table tennis at Berkshire Hathaway annual meetings against all challengers, but perhaps it’s no surprise that no insurance bods have beaten her yet. Given Ariel’s strong performance this year, I think insurers would need some serious training to even start to make her worried.

Her latest flame

I heard last week that Thompson Heath & Bond’s head of compliance Catherine Nicoll was one of the final Olympic torchbearers before the flame finally reached the main stadium for the opening ceremony. I’m told that Catherine took the torch to THB’s Leadenhall Street office, and that brokers were queuing up to have their photo taken with it. Another industry figure carrying the flame was Travelers Syndicate Management manager Mark Clifford, who ran a 300m section of the relay in Brentwood, Essex, in recognition of the work he has done for Macmillan Cancer Support.

Grappling with success

Congratulations are also in order for Mitsui Sumitomo employee Yoshie Ueno, who claimed an Olympic bronze medal in the women’s under 63kg judo competition last week. I understand that Yoshie is also a double world champion in the category.

Six of the best

When JLT boss Dominic Burke was invited to attend the Olympics opening ceremony by Stephen Catlin, he briefly entertained the thought that he was the Catlin boss’s favoured broker. Dominic later discovered that Stephen had also invited Marsh’s Brian Duperreault and Dan Glaser, Aon’s Greg Case, and Ryan Specialty’s Pat Ryan. Two’s company, six is a crowd, eh Dominic?

 

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