Hotel on the theme "Change -- Evolution or Revolution?'' One of Bermuda's newest insurance companies will be spotlighted during the Friday morning session when Mr. Robert Virtue, president and CEO of CHAIC Ltd., will discuss alternative risk transfer (ART) after the Kobe earthquake.

CHAIC Ltd. was formed in Bermuda this summer to provide Caribbean Hotel Association member properties with insurance. Mr. Virtue was formerly president of International Risk Management in Bermuda.

After today's registration and reception the meetings begin in earnest tomorrow with an opening by Premier Dr. David Saul.

Organisers, Coopers & Lybrand and Hawksmere plc, say that a panel of experienced professionals, leading international insurance experts, regulators and advisors will discuss the changes taking place in the reinsurance market.

The focus will be on the problems of today, the opportunities of tomorrow and who will be able to exploit them.

Some 190 insurance and reinsurance professionals, brokers and underwriters, regulators, lawyers and accountants and other market participants are registering today from Bermuda, the US and the UK, Canada, Bahamas, Bulgaria, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, New Zealand, Spain, Switzerland and Mexico.

The four-day conference is billed as the established `must-attend' event for all reinsurance professionals.

Tomorrow's discussions begin by centring on the Lloyd's and London markets problems of today and what they translate into for the future. There will be much talk about corporate capital, the Names litigation and global settlement.

After consideration of how long London's problems will persist, the conference turns its attention to the US market and environmental and other mass tort reform.

There will be presentations on the regulator's role -- "Promoting the Market or Protecting the Consumer?''