Most reinsurance arbitrations proceed under a confidentiality order or agreement. When the arbitration is over, if a party goes to court to confirm or vacate, a motion to seal is often made in an effort to comply with the parties’ agreement on confidentiality. But it is up to the court whether to seal.
Read more: When Petitions to Vacate and Confirm and Motions to Seal CollideIn Tyson International Co., Ltd. v. Partner Reinsurance Europe, SE, No. 1:25-cv-03152 (ALC) (SDNY Mar. 31, 2026), after a long and complicated arbitration involving a captive insurance company’s dispute with its reinsurer over settlement of a substantial fire loss in a poultry rendering facility and the valuation of the property, the arbitration panel issued an award in favor of the cedent but at an amount substantially lower than the amount sought from the reinsurer. Accordingly, the cedent sought to vacate that portion of the award concerning the valuation issue, or alternatively, vacating the entire award and remanding it back to the panel. The reinsurer sought to confirm. Both parties sought to seal various portions of the submissions.
In a separate decision, the court denied the petition to vacate the award and granted the petition to confirm the award. The court found that the cedent did not allege a statutory basis for vacatur and rejected the claims of manifest disregard of the law and that the panel exceeded its authority. Notably, the court quoted the honorable engagement language in the arbitration clause in support of its denial of the motion to vacate.
As to the requests to seal, the court granted the motions in part and denied the motions in part. The court noted that both parties conceded that the documents they sought to seal were judicial documents, which puts the burden on the proponents to show that sealing is necessary to preserve higher values.
The court categorized the exhibits into three categories: (1) the contracts/policies in the underlying dispute; (2) transcripts and opinions from the arbitration; and (3) internal correspondence. This was in addition to the petitions and memoranda of law.
Confidentiality was touted as a key protection of arbitration and the basis for sealing. Also that sealing was appropriate because of proprietary business information in the documents. The court agreed that the documents in category 1 should remain sealed, but denied the request for the other two categories because they contained large portions of non-commercial and non-confidential information. Thus, the court ordered the parties to file redacted portions of the documents in the last two categories.
