Throwback Thursday: ‘Goldfinger’ of Lloyd’s attempts comeback

19 December 1985: Posgate tries a comeback

Ian Posgate, who was suspended by Lloyd’s after the Alexander Howden affair, was hoping to return as an underwriter for RL Glover’s Syndicate 162 when his suspension ended at the start of 1986.

Once one of the highest paid men in Britain, Posgate rose to fame underwriting war risks for Names, making £20m to £30m from insuring shipments on the Mekong river in Vietnam.

He charged 5% of cargo value per month, a “huge premium”.

He was regularly in trouble for breaching the rules and in the 1970s, the committee of Lloyd’s ruled he could no longer underwrite on behalf of Names, so he joined managing agent Alexander Howden under the wing of Kenneth Grob, nicknamed ‘the Grobfather’.

When Howden was later acquired by Alexander & Alexander, there was an investigation into $55m (£43.4m) in missing funds.

That later turned into criminal charges against Posgate, Grob and other Howden directors.

Although he was cleared of the charges after a 15-month trial, Posgate found it difficult to return to underwriting. He however remained a Lloyd’s Name until his death in 2017.

Back in 1985, when he was looking to make his comeback, Posgate said through his lawyers that it would be “improper and/or unreasonable” to prevent him from returning to Lloyd’s.