Property/casualty insurance rates dropped by an average of 9% in October compared with levels of a year earlier, Dallas-based insurance exchange MarketScout reported Monday.

In the aftermath of the record-breaking 2005 hurricane season, there has been extensive press coverage of skyrocketing property insurance premiums for coastal property owners. Some risks are reporting premium increases of more than 500% for Florida properties, with adequate capacity for the largest risks unavailable at any price. But coastal properties are not the only ones being targeted by insurers for rate hikes. While not widely reported in the media, properties in earthquake-exposed areas, especially in California, are also experiencing sharply higher premiums and reduced capacity. Although there has not been a serious earthquake in California since the Northridge Earthquake in 1994, within the past several months risk managers are reporting that they are paying, in some cases, twice as much in premium for half the amount of earthquake coverage.

Bay Area Commercial earthquake insurance rates are skyrocketing due to the impacts of Hurricane Katrina and other recent catastrophes on the global insurance industry.

"Overall, the Bay Area is taking about a 40 percent hit," said Mike Korn, managing principal of the San Francisco office of Integro Ltd., and international New York-based insurance brokerage.

NEW YORK (Reuters)—Insurers of World Trade Center buildings destroyed in the Sept. 11 attacks won a victory when a federal judge Tuesday ruled they need not pay policy holders an extra $700 million to make a rebuilt complex better than it was.

Judge Harold Baer of the U.S. district court in Manhattan accepted the insurers' arguments the three "replacement cost" policies capped payouts at what it would cost to rebuild the site precisely as it existed prior to Sept. 11, 2001.

He rejected arguments by developer Silverstein Properties Inc. that it should recover the additional $700 million to make a rebuilt complex safe, modern and politically acceptable.

SACRAMENTO, Calif.—California Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi is recommending a 9.5% decrease in the workers compensation pure premium rates for policies beginning as of Jan. 1.