2020年经济学人爆炸后的黎巴嫩保险公司(1)（打印版）

A homeowner in Achrafieh does not care if the investigation is a sham, only that it rules that the explosion was an accident.

阿什拉斐叶区的一位私房屋主并不在乎调查的真假，只在乎调查是否会判定此次爆炸是一场意外。

Otherwise his insurance policy will pay nothing.

否则他的保险单将分文不付。

The owner of a ruined boutique down the hill in Mar Mikhael would prefer the opposite result:

马尔·米哈埃尓山下的一家被毁精品店的老板则更希望有相反的结果：

her policy covers terrorism, unlike most, and will compensate her for an estimated $100,000 in repairs and lost inventory.

与大多数保单不同，她的保单包含恐怖袭击，并将赔偿她大约10万美元的维修和库存损失。

The manager of a car-rental firm wonders if his explosion cover will include one of the largest nonnuclear explosions in history,

一家汽车租赁公司的经理想知道，他的保单中的爆炸是否包括历史上最大的非核爆炸之一，

since his vehicles were flattened by falling debris, not the blast itself.

因为他的汽车都是被坠落的碎片摧毁，而非爆炸本身。

The explosion that ripped through Beirut on August 4th,

8月4日，发生在贝鲁特的爆炸

caused by 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate stored improperly for years at the port, devastated much of the city centre.

由多年来在港口储存不当的2750吨硝酸铵造成的，摧毁了市中心的大部分地区。

More than 200 people are dead or missing, thousands wounded, and an estimated 300,000 are homeless. The damage to property could reach $15bn.

有超过两百人死亡或失踪，数千人受伤，预估有30万人无家可归。财产损失可能高达150亿美元。

A chunk of that will land on insurance companies in Lebanon, with consequences for banks and foreign reinsurers.

其中的一大部分将落到黎巴嫩的保险公司身上，并对银行和外国再保险公司造成影响。

In 2018 Lebanese insurers paid out around $90m to settle property and casualty claims. Insured losses at the port alone could now run to $250m.

2018年，黎巴嫩保险公司支付了约9000万美元来解决财产和伤亡索赔。仅港口的保险损失现在就可能高达2.5亿美元。

Victims have filed 2,500 claims for $425m in damages across the city, according to Raoul Nehme, the caretaker economy minister.

根据临时代理经济部长拉乌尔·内赫姆，全市受灾群众共提出2500项赔偿要求，索赔金额为4.25亿美元。

Insurers expect the number of claims to quadruple and the final price tag to hit $3bn.

保险公司预计，索赔数量将增长3倍，最终金额将达到30亿美元。

That is almost double the annual revenue of Lebanon's 52 insurers, which wrote $1.7bn in gross premiums in 2018.

这几乎是黎巴嫩52家保险公司年收入的两倍，2018年，这些保险公司的总保险费为17亿美元。

Claims are frozen until the government finishes investigating the blast.

在政府完成爆炸调查之前，索赔将被冻结。

Insurers would largely be off the hook if it were a deliberate act (there is no evidence to suggest it was).

如果爆炸是蓄意引发的，那么保险公司很大程度上能够摆脱困境（没有证据表明是蓄意的）。

An act of war would trigger force majeure clauses, and most policies do not cover terrorism.

战争行为将触发不可抗力条款，而大多数保单都不包括恐怖袭击。

The worst scenario for insurers is also the most likely: that the blast was an accident.

对保险公司来说，最坏的情况也是最有可能的情况：爆炸只是一场意外。

That would trigger another set of claims, as insurers seek to collect from the owners of the warehouse where the ammonium nitrate was stored.

这将触发另一套索赔，保险公司试图从储存硝酸铵的仓库所有者那里收集这些索赔。