CITY AND SUBURBAN
Here's a new threat to Lloyd's endangered species market forces will force their way in
CHRISTOPHER FILDES
The members of Lloyd's of London are retiring, hurt. Their numbers are down by three-quarters, and this year, for the first time, more than half of Lloyd's capital belongs to the companies that are taking over from them. They don't want the com- panies to call the shots, though, or to have what would pass as majority rights. That, says the Association of Lloyd's Members, might subject Lloyd's ruling council to dominant market forces and reduce its independence. My goodness, yes. Anyone would think that Lloyd's was a business, with a board, and shareholders. The ALM's chairman, Sir David Berriman, used to be a merchant banker but has gone off markets these days: 'It cannot be right', he was say- ing last year, `to leave the capital structure and modus operandi of Lloyd's to market forces.' It was Sir David who explained to the House of Commons Treasury Commit- tee how he came to join Lloyd's: 'I went to an agent who was associated with my then employers and assumed that they would treat me as an insider and put one on bet- ter syndicates, but lo and behold I think every one they put me on has gone wrong, which shows that even they did not know any more than the rest of the market.' He was content so long as the cheques, howev- er small, kept coming but woke up when they stopped: 'It was when the losses start- ed flowing through that I took the attitude that I am damned if I am going to pay out this money unless I know why it is happen- mg.' Market forces had forced their way in. Now they have come round again, for Lloyd's is drifting back into losses, What it needs as a business is businesslike owners who can make sure that it is run in a busi- nesslike way. Its members need that, too, while they last.
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