IUMI has put forward Sean Dalton (pictured) as the sole candidate for its next presidency, a succession decision that lands alongside fresh data showing marine cargo loss ratios have improved for six consecutive years while offshore energy premiums have fallen sharply.
Dalton, subject to election by the IUMI Council on September 23 at the association's Annual Conference in Rotterdam, will succeed Frédéric Denèfle, who is completing a four-year term.
He currently serves as IUMI's vice-president and previously chaired its Cargo Committee. Outside IUMI, he chairs the American Institute of Marine Underwriters and is a former chair of the National Cargo Bureau. He is based in New York and serves as executive vice president and head of marine underwriting, North America, for Munich Reinsurance America.
"It is a tremendous honour to be nominated to serve as President of this 152-year-old association," said Dalton. IUMI traces its founding to a meeting of 39 companies in Berlin in January 1874.
Dalton thanked Denèfle for strengthening IUMI's position as the global voice of marine insurance, and described an industry navigating geopolitical uncertainty, rapid technological change and a transition to a more sustainable future.
Offshore energy premiums fell 7.9% to US$4.34 billion in 2024, according to IUMI's Stats Report 2025, driven by lower oil prices, sanctions, decarbonisation pressures and shifting market capacity.
For brokers placing offshore energy risk, that contraction points to a market where underwriters are pulling back rather than competing aggressively on rate, a dynamic worth factoring into renewal conversations over the coming cycle.
Cargo tells a different story. According to the same IUMI report, cargo premiums rose 1.6% to US$22.64 billion in 2024, and loss ratios improved for the sixth consecutive year, helped by China's performance and an absence of major catastrophic losses.
That sustained improvement in claims experience gives brokers a stronger hand when negotiating cargo terms, though underwriters are likely to keep scrutinising submissions closely as broader economic and geopolitical uncertainty persists.
Hull performed steadily too: ocean hull premiums rose 3.5% to US$9.67 billion, driven by higher vessel values and steady shipping activity, with Europe continuing to dominate the market and Russia's domestic hull market growing 42% as international sanctions forced local risk retention there.
Overall, global marine insurance premiums reached US$39.92 billion in 2024, a 1.5% increase on 2023, though growth has slowed markedly from the 5.9% recorded the previous year. That deceleration traces mainly to offshore energy's near-8% contraction outweighing otherwise steady gains in hull and cargo, rather than a broad-based slowdown across every line.
IUMI secretary general Lars Lange said geopolitical and trade tensions have generated significant uncertainty around war risks, tariffs and other economic measures, a backdrop that brokers placing hull and cargo risk should expect to keep shaping underwriter appetite through the rest of the year.
If elected, Dalton said his focus would include attracting and retaining talent, promoting diversity and inclusion, and helping members harness artificial intelligence, alongside keeping sustainability central to IUMI's agenda. None of those priorities changes underwriting terms overnight, since IUMI is a trade association rather than a market or regulator.
But the AI focus is worth tracking over his term, given IUMI's role in shaping data standards through initiatives such as its Major Claims Database and Hull Inflation Index. Brokers placing marine risk may eventually see underwriting submission requirements and turnaround expectations shift as those standards evolve.
Dalton's own background, a graduate of the United States Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point with a Third Mate Unlimited Tonnage licence and Navy Reserve service, gives him a practical grounding in shipping that some senior figures in the market lack.
Taken together, the figures suggest a market where brokers face divergent conditions depending on the line.
Offshore energy capacity is contracting, giving underwriters more pricing power, while cargo's sustained loss ratio improvement leaves more room for brokers to push back on terms, and hull sits somewhere in between, with steady growth but a market still dominated by European capacity.
Dalton's incoming leadership, with its stated focus on technology and data, may shape how submission requirements evolve, but for now the more immediate signal for brokers is the diverging capacity picture across marine's core lines.
