Fathom Re, the Dallas-based reinsurance intermediary set up last year by a group of former BMS Re brokers, has named industry veteran Mark Rex as its managing partner, in a move that strengthens the start-up's senior ranks and signals an expanded reach into the Florida property catastrophe market.
Rex, who is based in the greater Tampa Bay area, brings more than two decades of reinsurance broking experience to the role. The announcement said he would help shape the firm's strategic direction and oversee key initiatives, with a particular focus on business development and the build-out of its technology and analytics platforms.
He arrives from BMS Re, where he had served as executive vice-president since January 2024. Before that, Rex was managing partner at Trean Reinsurance Intermediaries from August 2021, while concurrently holding a senior vice-president position at JLT Re.
He was earlier chief executive of Re Group Intermediaries from 2014, and spent a decade at Axiom Re from the start of the 2000s.
The appointment brings Rex back into the orbit of familiar faces. Fathom Re was founded by partners Matthew Haynes, Steve Pekala and Jarad Binder, all of whom left BMS Re to start the firm, with parts of the team tracing their lineage to Trean Reinsurance Intermediaries, the franchise BMS later absorbed.
The intermediary, which describes itself as a specialist in designing, executing and servicing customized reinsurance programs, has also licensed Verisk catastrophe models to underpin its analytics offering, an unusual capability investment for a firm still in its second year of operation.
Rex's Tampa base puts him at the heart of a market in transition. Florida remains the focal point of US property catastrophe reinsurance and a key driver of catastrophe bond issuance globally, but conditions have shifted sharply from the crisis years.
Florida's Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, the state's insurer of last resort, has approved rate reductions for personal lines policyholders for 2026, its first cuts since 2015, and expects its policy count to fall to about 385,000 by the end of 2025, down roughly 73% from a peak of 1.42 million in October 2023, in figures reported earlier in the cycle.
Citizens has also indicated it expects lower reinsurance costs in 2026, citing softening catastrophe rates and reduced exposure.
Reinsurer appetite has followed. Adam Schwebach, head of property for North America at Gallagher Re, said earlier this year that reinsurers were again willing to attach at lower levels in Florida programs after retreating during the state's litigation crisis, with legislative reforms helping to draw capacity back and supporting the entry of 17 new insurers.
Founded in 2025 and headquartered in Dallas, Fathom Re markets transparency and accountability as central to its model. The Rex hire adds further senior broking capacity as the firm continues to scale.
