BP oil spill trial has begun

my interest is how the respective insurance carriers will respond to this.

I can see how policies forms for these folks ( well, policy not in the simplest form like we know....reinsurers is more likely what they have for cat claims ) may not have even been decided on at time of loss. Most reinsurance "treaties" are done on 4/1 each year.

There is a boatload of $$$$ at stake here. Its going to be an interesting settlement.

You're talking about carriers for BP, Transocean and Halliburton?

As far as I know, there hasn't really been much involvement with insurers. BP self insures. I think that Lloyd's underwrites Transocean but I suspect that the limits are well well below the range of damages we're talking about here. Not sure about Halliburton but I don't recall any activity from any Halliburton insurer.