But the big question this year is who will the rating agencies turn into the talking point of the Rendez-Vous?

Whistleblower looks at the big questions for this year’s reinsurance Rendez-Vous and asks will they follow a familiar pattern?

The great and the good are heading off to Monte Carlo for the annual Rendez-Vous. It will be the 50th anniversary of an event which has become the traditional opening fixture for the reinsurance renewal season and this year looks likely to follow the trend of recent years in more ways than one.

The debate will be all about natural catastrophe, or the lack of them, and the impact on the underwriters’ thinking when the real discussions get underway in October.

Will the reinsurance market forget the harsh lessons of the recent past? Can they afford to? These are questions that have been raised on a regular basis at Rendez-Vous of the past and generally the answers have been “Yes” and “No”.

As the half century is reached for Monte Carlo’s hosting of the event there have been questions raised over why it should be staged in the tax haven playground of the rich and famous?

Put quite simply the venue is a draw for an event which is an informal opening of the renewal discussions. If it was held in Turin or even Marseille would it have the attraction or the attention? I very much doubt it.

But the big question this year is who will the rating agencies turn into the talking point of the Rendez-Vous?

In recent years we have seen rating agencies announce eleventh hour downgrades of the likes of Convarium and Alea along with one year when a leading ratings analyst said he viewed the rating of Munich Re as somewhat lower than the one it currently enjoyed.

Throw in the placing of ten major entities on creditwatch for a downgrade following Katrina last year and the ratings agencies have always sought to dominate the news agenda in recent times.

The question is does one of them have another downgrade up their sleeve?