which stopped writing new business four months ago after suffering heavy losses since it was formed in 1989.

Mr. Malcolm Butterfield, Registrar of Companies and Official Receiver, has been appointed provisional liquidator.

An application is being made to appoint International Advisory Services, Bermuda's largest independently-owned management group, as special manager to help with the liquidation.

Bristol Re's assets are understood to be in the region of $23.5 million, with liabilities not considerably higher than this.

The appointment of IAS is expected to quicken the liquidation of Bristol Re and make the proces smore cost-effective.

IAS took over the management of Bristol Re from Stockholm Management in October, 1991, by which time Bristol Re had already suffered the worst of its problems.

Mr. David Ezekiel, president of IAS, said it would have been "very difficult'' to have run off Bristol Re's business instead of liquidating the company.

"All you need is one creditor, no matter how large or small, who is not happy with it and it would simply not work,'' he said.

A scheme of arrangement is expected to be put in place to pay creditors a significant portion of what they are owed.

All creditors, brokers and ceding companies are in the process of being contacted.

"A scheme of arrangement will achieve all that a run off would achieve but, at the same time, give the company the protection of the court,'' said Mr.

Ezekiel. "By introducing a scheme of arrangement, there's no danger of one creditor trying to jump the queue.'' Most of Bristol Re's creditors are UK insurance companies.

A number of London companies writing during the same years as Bristol Re have also gone under, said Mr. Ezekiel.

"Relative to others, the liquidation of Bristol Re should be a fairly manageable one,'' he added.

"It only commenced writing on January 1, 1989, and only wrote any substantial business for three years -- 1989, 1990 and 1991.

"None of the business was really long tail and the liquidation should not take too long.

"The company's creditors number in the hundreds, rather than the thousands, and there is not legal action to speak of.'' Bristol Re is owned by Greek shipping magnate Mr. Stavros Niarchos, whose 22-ship operation is based in London and Athens.

Bristol Re was a stand-alone entity within the Niarchos group and was not involved in any of its insurance placements.

The company ran into financial problems soon after it began writing business in 1989.

Most of its losses were suffered in the 1989, 1990 and 1991 underwriting years, much of which related to catastrophes like Hurricane Hugo, the European winter storms and incidents involving China Airlines, Arco Texas and Southbend.

Bristol Re continued to write a small book of business in 1992 and 1993 but continuing adverse development on the early underwriting years led to the company ceasing underwriting in early 1993.

The company then ceased all claims payments on August 9, 1993, pending an actuarial review of loss reserves. "The results of this review confirmed that Bristol Re is unlikely to have sufficient assets to meets its remaining liabilities,'' said Mr. Ezekiel.