MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — Reinsurance buyers remain on course for a stable year-end renewal season, despite recent hurricane losses in the United States, experts say.

Reinsurers withstood more than $100 billion in catastrophe losses in 2017, and hurricanes Florence and Michael in 2018 are unlikely to significantly change market conditions as renewals gather pace.

While cedents that suffered losses may see increases, renewal terms and conditions will likely reflect individual experience, they said during the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America annual meeting in Miami Beach, Florida, last week.

“We would expect property catastrophe rates to remain flattish, with maybe a small improvement, but nothing material, on loss-free accounts,” said Steve Levy, president and CEO of the reinsurance division at Munich Reinsurance America Inc. in Princeton, New Jersey.

PCI is the third of the major reinsurance meetings that take place in the late summer and fall where cedents, reinsurers and brokers gather to assess market conditions and begin renewal discussions.

The reinsurance market is stable, and catastrophe losses so far this year likely won’t disrupt the market going into year-end renewals, said Keith Wolfe, Armonk, New York-based president of U.S. property/casualty at Swiss Re Ltd.

“My expectation would be stability. I don’t seen reasons for rates to drop,” he said, noting that rating levels would vary by line.

Reinsurance capacity remains plentiful, with capital being provided by traditional reinsurers and alternative capital investors. “And that’s OK, because it creates the ability to insure underinsured risks like flood and earthquake. We want to help our clients grow by writing more risks,” Mr. Wolfe said.

After last year’s catastrophes, some reinsurers were expecting marketwide rate increases, which did not materialize, said Brian Ingle, executive vice president at Willis Re, a unit of Willis Towers Watson PLC, in New York.

“This year reinsurers are much more focused on ‘What have your results been?’ and applying rate increases or decreases based on experience,” he said.

“There is a fair amount of capital and capacity devoted to the property catastrophe market, so I do think that was one of the reasons why there was a muted reaction to the historic level of events last year,” Mr. Levy said of last year’s Jan. 1 renewals.

That capacity stands in contrast to the historic losses of last year and leaves the market looking for direction, said Ed Hochberg, CEO of JLT Re (North America) Inc. in Philadelphia.

“On the one hand, you’ve got two years of fairly significant loss activity,” Mr. Hochberg said. “Yet on the other hand, we still have very, very plentiful capacity and supply.”

“It’s not entirely clear what direction it’s going to take,” Mr. Hochberg said. “It’s murkier than it’s felt in some time.”

While hurricanes Michael and Florence resulted in losses for some insurers, reinsurance programs were not significantly affected by the storms for the most part, Mr. Ingle said.

Although Hurricane Michael was one of the most powerful storms to hit the continental United States when it made landfall on the Florida panhandle in October, it did not hit a major population center, and Hurricane Florence was largely a flood event, which hit some commercial insurers but was not a significant loss for personal lines insurers, he said.

While the reinsurance industry absorbed the 2017 catastrophe losses “without missing a beat” and reinsurers continue to expand their product offerings to write more business, there remains plentiful capacity in the sector, said Jonathan M. Colello, New York-based president of Axis Re North America, a unit of Axis Capital Holdings Ltd.

“That supply-and-demand imbalance generates short-term returns that are lower than the cost of capital for the industry as a whole, so that’s a problem that’s unsustainable,” he said.

From a reinsurance buyer’s perspective, the market is seeing healthy competition with reinsurers seeking to differentiate themselves to win business, said Julia Chu, New York-based chief global ceded reinsurance officer at Markel Corp.

“It’s not about capital, it’s not about size, it’s about how you can help your clients solve problems,” she said.

On the casualty side, auto insurers and reinsurers have increased rates over the past several years, although the price increases are not yet being reflected in financial results, Mr. Wolfe said.

General liability and professional liability rates have increased, but “loss cost trends are at or slightly ahead of rate improvements,” he said.

Workers compensation has been a profitable line of business for the past several years, and rates are declining, “but we think the loss frequency has come down a bit,” Mr. Wolfe said.

“Commercial auto is a troubled line of business, so what you’re seeing there is a correction with reinsurers saying we’re not going to write this business at 120 combined ratio,” Mr. Hochberg said. “Property-catastrophe gets all the headlines, but really, if there’s a pocket where we’re seeing more discipline and resistance, it’s in the casualty lines.”

“We’re very concerned about the situation for commercial liability,” Mr. Levy said. “Commercial auto has been an issue for a while now, but other commercial liability segments are turning problematic as far as we’re concerned with rising claims activity outpacing rate increases.”

Reinsurers are also negotiating a little harder, sources said.

“Reinsurers are pushing back on terms and conditions and ceding commissions,” Mr. Hochberg said.

“Starting in late 2016 and early 2017, we started seeing ceding commissions leveling off and coming down,” Mr. Levy said.