Fla. CAT Fund Has $3B Available for Hurricane Claims

Almost $3 billion is available to pay for claims from Hurricane Dennis and any other storms that may hit the state according to Mike McCauley, a spokesman for the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund. Risk assessment groups put initial estimates for U.S. insured damages at $1 billion to $5 billion from Dennis.

Although the fund’s reserves were heavily hit in 2004, it is still quite solvent, McCauley said.

“It’s still early, and it may be weeks or months before the claims start coming in,” McCauley told Reuters. “It takes several weeks for the assessments to be done.”

In 2004, when four major hurricanes struck Florida, the fund paid out about $3.5 billion to insurance companies claiming extraordinary losses.

The fund now has nearly $3 billion on hand and expects to have about the same amount of reserves at year end after paying claims from Dennis and any other storms, McCauley said.