Validus Specialty Underwriting Services has hired Corina Monaghan as head of political risk and trade credit, Americas. She replaces Jared Kotler, who left the group in September to lead The Hartford’s newly-created credit and political risk insurance (CPRI) unit.

Monaghan joins the company following a five-year stint at JLT North America, where she was head of political risks. Prior to that, she held political risk consulting, brokerage and underwriting roles at Willis Financial Solutions, Aon Crisis Management, Coface North America and Chubb.

At Validus Specialty, Monaghan will lead the political risk and trade credit insurance team, based in New York. She brings to Validus her expertise in political risk, both public and private sector underwriting, and broking, as well as her client relationship network in North and South America, and across Europe, leveraging her fluency in German, Spanish and Portuguese.

“Attracting a leader like Corina underscores that our entrepreneurial culture appeals to top-notch industry talent. Political risk and credit insurance is already an important piece in our growing product suite, she’s well poised to make it more so,” says Jonathan Ritz, CEO of Validus Specialty.

Commenting on her appointment, Monaghan tells GTR: “This new role allows me to take a very bespoke approach and carve out solutions that are very tailored to a specific client. I’m looking forward to further enabling clients to understand where political risk and credit can facilitate their business. The current market is competitive from a pricing standpoint. There is still a lot of work to be done to properly educate clients in the US on these products and Validus Specialty is poised to do this.”