“Peak Re is a reinsurer that aims to modernise the reinsurance industry and helps our clients to achieve better financial position and protection.”
Name:
Cathy Chen
Company: Peak Re Job:
Chief financial officer Timeline: 2013—Chief financial officer, Peak Re
Cathy Chen is chief financial officer of Peak Re. She was appointed the role in October 2013 and her responsibilities include overseeing the financial and operational management of Peak Re. She has more than 10 years of accounting and financial experience in insurance related industry. Prior to joining Peak Re, Chen was chief representative for
Lloyd’s at the market’s Beijing representative office, where she was responsible for the promotion of Lloyd’s brand and enhancing the organisation’s government relations in China. Before working at Lloyd’s, she was CFO for Swiss Re’s China operation.
What has been the highlight of your career so far? Joining Peak Re is certainly a highlight of my career. It is very encouraging to see the good and solid progress we have made in our business and financial performance. With only two years after inception, Peak Re is able to
achieve a positive technical underwriting result which is a great accomplishment of the team. As the CFO of the company, I am glad that my past experience gained from the various international insurance and reinsurance companies allows me to provide an independent, yet holistic view on how our capital should be allocated from top-down, and creates value for the company.
What has been the biggest challenge you have
encountered? It is not easy to achieve an excellent ROE in the current market as the reinsurance industry is in a soft cycle. From shareholders’ point of view, there is an opportunity cost between investing the capital into reinsurance or into other investment options. In addition, Peak Re is a young company, we need to grow and generate profit. However, this is not a task one should solely rely on the CEO, hence I need to and have been working very closely
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with my CEO to execute the business plan and meet our short term and long term targets. Another challenge that I have encountered, which may also be a challenge for other CFOs in this industry, is to maintain or improve the company’s credit rating. The reinsurance industry has been given a “negative” outlook. With this negative outlook, greater effort is needed to persuade rating agencies for a rating upgrade despite our good business performance enjoyed. Hence, I have tried to keep constant dialogues with rating agencies
to help them better understand how Peak Re has been doing from the financial point of view and build their confidence in us.
What are your career aspirations now? Peak Re is a reinsurer that aims to modernise the reinsurance industry and helps our clients to achieve better financial position and protection. As the CFO of this visionary firm, I bring in new insights from my managerial and operational experience gained in various international re/insurance organisations. This helps the company build a strong and solid financial system that supports, not only our clients, but also the ultimate end-user of the insurance protection, ie, the general public. As I have always wanted to be useful to the society and contribute what I have learnt to the community, and therefore this role fits my aspiration perfectly.
2015 | INTELLIGENT INSURER | 27
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