Cancelling London Olympics Would Cost over $4.9 Billion: Munich Re

Cancelling the London Olympics due, for example, to a security threat would result in damages of more than €4 billion ($4.9 billion), Andrew Duxbury, underwriting manager at Munich Re, told a German newspaper.

“This was the sum of the insurable risks of loss at the 2010 World Cup and the Olympic Games should be in the same category,” he was quoted as saying on Monday by Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

He added that in the case of a cancellation, the loss for Munich Re could be around €350 million [$428 million].

London’s Olympic Games are not threatened by a major security contractor’s failure to find enough staff, ministers and the head of the city’s organizing committee said on Sunday, seeking to quell a political storm ahead of athletes’ arrival.

Last week, the British government announced it would draft in 3,500 extra troops as cover after contractor G4S admitted it was unlikely to train the guards it had promised under its £284 million ($441.5 million) contract in time.

(Reporting by Christoph Steitz; Editing by Mark Potter)