The conduct of electronic commerce in the insurance sector just got slightly warmer with the announcement last week that eighteen insurers, brokers and reinsurers have banded together in a co-operative online venture designed to cut down on processing and administrative costs.

The 18 are: ACE International, Allianz, Aon, Axa, Benfield Greig, CGU, ERC, Generali, Hartford, Jardine Lloyd Thompson, six managing agents at Lloyd's of London -- ACE, Beazley, Brockbank, DP Mann, Hiscox and Octavian, Marsh, Munich Re, Scor, Swiss Re, Willis and Zurich.

The group will undertake trading on Wise, a network which combines the activities of Rinet, a Brussels-based organisation that linked European reinsurers, Win, which is owned by four insurance brokers, and Limnet, which linked the London market.

So far very little electronic trading is being done in the insurance sector as compared to other industries. So far Wise has garnered 50,000 registered users.

The Gartner Group estimates that transaction-capable insurance sites will increase eightfold in 2000, with 72 percent of the carriers surveyed stating they will provide quotes over the Web by the end of next year, and 39 percent projecting they will be able to complete sales online.

The Second Annual CyberInsurance Conference, hosted by the Strategic Research Institute, will be held March 15-17 at the Scottsdale Princess Hotel in Scottsdale, Arizona. Telephone 212-967-0095, ext. 241 or cbailer srinstitute.com for information.

The Internet is a mine of information for the web-conscious investor. For the past six months I've been tracking the investor message boards of Bermuda's publicly traded insurance companies on Yahoo! ( www.yahoo.com ) investor notice board. On these commentary sites, various investors make remarks and gather information under pseudonyms about a particular company's prospects and what they think about management. All sorts hang out at these e-mail chat sites. I'm sure chief executives track these sites, cringing at the remarks lofted at them. Beware though. I believe there are more than a few company employees putting in some excuses and complements on behalf of the company. And you may find some unscrupulous investors attempting to boost a company's price so they can then dump the stock. Still, for pure entertainment value, the comments can be informative, sometimes scathing and at times humorous. One of the funniest Yahoo! notice board sites of late has been the Stirling Cooke Brown Holdings postings, where former Royal Gazette reporter David Marchant has been engaged in a puzzling flame war with those who contribute comments about the company. I say puzzling because some of the investors have been complaining about revelations of an arbitration judgment Mr. Marchant, who doesn't use a pseudonym, has made on the Stirling Cooke notice board, revelations which he is apparently about to publish today in his Miami-based Offshore Business News & Research newsletter. I can't imagine why investors would complain about such important market information. "Flame'' is computer lingo for what occurs when e-mail postings descend into rantings and accusations, a familiar occurrence for anyone who has attempted to make decent communications via e-mail and been misunderstood. Stirling Cooke is the Bermuda-based insurance broker backed by Goldman Sachs. The publicly-traded company stock has gone to about $2 a share from $30 amid accusations and suits regarding what is alleged are a series of frauds, called an insurance spiral, stemming from workers' compensation reinsurance with Unicover. (See related story in Insurance headlines.) Mr. Marchant has been keenly following the company's fortunes in his newsletter, getting access to some very damning documents from his sources. But his latest revelations has caused some personal attacks on the Yahoo! board. Many of the comments against him come from "ctinsguy'' who called him a "(expletive) little journalist who can't get a real job''. After some exchange and moderation from other users Mr.

Marchant e-mailed the group information which he claimed came from an arbitration decision involving the Alan Bird Syndicate and Transamerica. Mr.

Marchant admits he uses the notice board to plug his newsletters and the fact that he is selling copies of the arbitration document of December 1999. In his e-mails he states that two of the arbitrators alleged in the document that Stirling Cooke, through business brokered through the Alan Bird Syndicate into Transamerica, was "party to a deliberate reinsurance spiral'' that in part was allegedly "conceived during a meeting (held by) Nicholas Brown, Jeff Butler and Reg Billyard at a pub called The Green Man in Heronsgate, England, in August, 1992''. He also alleged that the Alan Bird's attorneys have discussed the possibility of suing Stirling Cooke in a letter also written last month. Some of those on the notice board responded by telling him to get off the notice board, after which Mr. Marchant called them "London barrow boys'' who should stick to selling fruit along the side of the road instead of being involved in the world of high finance. It seems the solicitors acting for the Alan Bird Syndicate were also tracking the notice board and have sent Mr. Marchant a letter threatening a suit against him for revealing details of the arbitration. He thrives on such stuff and the lawyers were ill-advised to lob such a missive at him. I had to laugh when Mr. Marchant -- a staunch Welshman who when I worked with him used to make vicious attacks about the US culture and behaviour -- responded by standing on his First Amendment rights under the US constitution and printing the letter. "Thank you Lord that I live in the US when it comes to freedom of speech,'' Mr. Marchant wrote. "The First Amendment shames equivalent UK laws.'' Perhaps he should frame that statement and put it on his desk.

Tech Tattle deals with topics relating to technology. Contact Ahmed at ahmedelamin hotmail.com or (01133) 4670 12599.