COMPANIES Prime minister Edward Heath, Lord Archer, Michael Howard. The roll call of Britons who have chosen to wager their fortunes backing the Lloyd’s insurance market over the years is long and often illustrious.
More than a decade has passed since the early 1990s when Lloyd’s was pushed to the brink of bankruptcy by a deluge of asbestos claims and most of these Names have since severed ties with the market. The many divorces and a clutch of suicides that followed were widely blamed on the financial ruin that thousands of Names faced. The vast majority left the market never to return, sheltering what was left of their investable assets in safer havens instead.
