Steadfast broking group looks to Asia

Australia's biggest insurance broking network, Steadfast, is targeting Asia as its network grows in Australia. Steadfast CEO Robert Kelly said, “We are starting to build a meaningful presence in Asia with affiliated brokers based in China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.” Steadfast controls nearly 350 brokerages across Australia with five new brokers joining it in the last 6 months of 2016. The network now accounts for nearly a third of all gross written premiums placed in Australia. The group is witnessing the first signs of an improvement in the prices small to medium-sized businesses pay for insurance portfolios. Kelly highlighted that the tide is turning on a long period of irrational policy pricing, after globally low interest rates helped drive a price war across the sector. “We are seeing the first signs of underwriters taking action to improve results, although it’s early days. Both the network and underwriting agencies benefited from a small degree of price improvement across our primarily SME customer base.”