One of Bermuda's newest insurance companies, Aspen Insurance, made a firm step in its commitment to the Island yesterday by taking a secondary listing on the Bermuda Stock Exchange.

The company marked the event with a cocktail party last night at City Hall, an event that Aspen chief executive Chris O'Kane cited as a celebration of the listing as well as a time for the executives to meet with clients in this market.

Its BSX listing is a secondary offering after Aspen made its initial launch on the New York Stock Exchange last December, raising nigh on $240 million.

Mr. O'Kane, who is also the deputy chairman of Aspen's Bermuda-based holding company and is based in London, was on the Island this week for one of what he said was expected to be at least nine visits to Bermuda this year.

In listing on the BSX, Aspen joins about 30 other Bermuda-based international companies to take up secondary listings on the Exchange.

Aspen has also been included on the Bermuda Insurance Index since April, increasing the Index's number of companies to 14, putting the combined market capital (as of that date) at $56.4 billion.

The timing of the BSX listing is apt with next week marking the firm's second anniversary.

Mr. O'Kane said: "Foundation day was June 21, 2002," adding that on that day they began with a staff of 39, who were all based in London.

Although at that time, there was no staff in the Bermuda office, Aspen's holding company has been legally based on the Island from that beginning.

Aspen ? which could be said to have grown out of Lloyd's-based insurer Wellington Underwriting Plc ? was originally focused on the London market, but Mr. O'Kane said a desire to diversify had led the company into numerous other markets.

In its first two years, Aspen has expanded its operations beyond Bermuda and the UK, to include three offices in the US.

Yesterday Mr. O'Kane said it made sense for the company to have a listing on the Island, and welcomed the opportunity to be more accessible to Bermuda investors.

However, he ruled out the company listing on the London Stock Exchange, despite the company having its largest operations in the UK, saying it was unnecessary now that the company was listed on the NYSE, and in Bermuda. The company did not get off the ground until the middle of 2002 ? about six months later than some of the other companies to set up in Bermuda after a void in capacity following the September 11 terrorist attacks ? but Mr. O'Kane said the company had done well despite not being the first out of the blocks.

He said Aspen may have been a late starter, but that the company had had an advantage that made up for the lag in the timing of its incorporation. That was its management and much of its initial business were effectively handed off by Wellington.

In fact, he said, a decision by the Wellington board paved the way for Aspen to set up and included the blessing to take 39 Wellington staff as well as the renewal rights to its treaty reinsurance business.

For the first year, Aspen was also given a share in some of Wellington's other business.

Now he said the company was posting higher gross premiums written than some of the Bermuda-based rivals who had had a head start.

Aspen reported net income of $85 million for the first quarter of the year and gross written premiums of $640.2 million with a combined ratio of 66 percent for the three-month period ended March 31, 2004. That result compared to $577.7 million in business written during the same period a year prior.

Mr. O'Kane, who is himself Irish, said that the break with Wellington was "amicable" and really a Wellington board driven decision.

Wellington chief executive Julian Avery continues the connection by sitting on the Aspen board. And Wellington remains a significant shareholder ? the Lloyd's operation holds second place as an investor after the Blackstone Group, a New York investment firm as the single largest founding shareholder.

Other principal shareholders backing the company were Candover Partners Limited and Credit Suisse First Boston Private Equity.

Although Mr. O'Kane is based in London, the company's chief financial officer, Julian Cusack (who was previously finance director for Wellington) is based on the Island and the two reportedly see each other on a regular basis.

Mr. O'Kane joked that the two may see each other more than colleagues who work on different floors of the same office, with each travelling back and forth a few times a year, and he said it is rare for a day to go by that does not see them speaking by telephone.

Aspen's initial staffing of former Wellington staff (whom Mr. O'Kane referred to as the company's "co-founders") has, in the just shy of two years since, expanded to some 200 employees across the three markets it operates in.

That is a rapid ramp up when you consider that Aspen started out with fewer than 40 staff. But by the end of 2002, Mr. O'Kane said that number had already nearly doubled, with the group growing to about 70 staff. And by now, that number is closer to 195, Mr. O'Kane said.

Although not putting an exact number on the employees working from the Bermuda office, Mr. O'Kane said it was about a dozen and that he expected that number to grow quickly. He did not project how many could be working in this office by the end of the year, but said staffing up would go hand in hand with growth which was expected to be "rapid".

Despite Aspen's primary operations being in the UK, Mr. O'Kane told the company's focus was on all its offices.

He added that he expected to see "a greater rate of growth" in the company's Bermuda and US operations than in the company's London outfit.

"In insurance it makes sense to have a balanced portfolio," he said, indicating a business model with a mix of different lines of business being written from different operations.

This is the path taken by most of the post-2001 reinsurers ? with the majority having branched out now to having operations on both sides of the Atlantic ? although one, Montpelier Re, is the notable exception with that company saying previously that it planned to stick to writing business out of its Bermuda office.

Mr. O'Kane said Aspen intended to follow a path of not being "over reliant on any one place or line of business. There needs to be diversification and the way to do that is to have significant Bermuda operations and US operations".

He added that Aspen had in a way "inherited the London opportunity" whereas the Bermuda and US operations were green pastures.

He said Aspen's business plan was one of deciding which lines of business it wanted to be in and then determining where they would be best placed to write that business from.

He said those decisions would sometimes be driven by regulatory requirements, and at other times, by opportunity.

For example, to write regulated insurance in the US market, one needs to have operations on that side, and the same could be said to be true for the UK market where Aspen is reportedly the largest independent reinsurer to have the approval of the UK's Financial Services Authority (FSA).

As for global business, particularly on the reinsurance side, Mr. O'Kane said that could be written from "any number of places" but that Bermuda was ideal especially for excess casualty, and excess property insurance ? areas where the Island has historically been a leader.

Likewise, Aspen's focus in the UK was said to lean towards that market's strong areas: marine, aviation and energy.

But that, he said, did not mean, London was the only place it would write that business.

"These are not absolutes. This does not mean that we can't write this (business) elsewhere. Strong does not mean the only place, but a strong place.

"The first question though is what lines of business do we want to be in. Question two is do we have the people and then where is the best place to do this from," he concluded.

Aspen's largest operation, for now, remains in London, but that is already showing signs of change.

On top of the 12 or so in its local office, Aspen has a growing number of staff based with its US subsidiaries with about 40 employees in its Boston office, nine in the Hartford, Connecticut operation and another seven in New Jersey. That leaves the balance of the 130 or so staff, based in the UK.

Although Aspen's management, and indeed much support for the then fledgling venture came from Wellington, Mr. O'Kane said there was no tie between the company and the Lloyd's of London market.

Other early ties have also been severed, although with no hard feelings. A case in point is the resignation of veteran executive Tony Taylor ? CEO of another Bermuda start-up Montpelier Re ? from the Aspen board earlier this year.

Mr. O'Kane said that he had known Mr. Taylor for some 20 years ? with both having come to their respective posts from Wellington ? but that the decision was made for the latter to step down from the board in January. The reasons were said to be Mr. Taylor's business commitments with Montpelier as well as "the conflict aspect" with both being players in the same market.

Mr. Taylor was, at the time of quitting his seat on the Aspen board, said to have been an important contributor in efforts leading to the company's successful initial offering in December, 2003.

He retains an investment in the company, with Mr. O'Kane saying Mr. Taylor held about six percent of Aspen's outstanding shares.