Best of Artemis, week ending 23rd August 2015

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending 23rd August 2015, covering catastrophe bonds, ILS, reinsurance capital and related risk transfer topics. To ensure you never miss a thing subscribe to the weekly Artemis email newsletter updates.

Top ten most viewed articles on Artemis.bm, week ending 23rd August 2015:

1. Biggest reinsurance firms putting their risk management to the test
   It is increasingly apparent from the second-quarter results season that the largest reinsurance companies in the world will, at some stage, see their risk management practices tested, as they continue to take on increasing amounts of risk at lower pricing and with expanded terms.

2. 2015 catastrophe bond & ILS issuance passes $6bn from 40 deals
   Catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) issuance recorded in the Artemis Deal Directory has passed the $6 billion mark already in 2015, as the rapid rate of issuance and growing number of private deals helps the market maintain a near record pace.

3. S&P warns on reinsurers protecting profits through reserve releases
   In the current soft reinsurance market environment, some reinsurers have been relying on prudent reserving and timely releases of capital to protect or enhance their profits. But with major losses remaining absent from the market, dwindling reserves could come back to bite.

4. Tianjin explosion insurance losses could hit $1.5bn (or higher)
   The insurance and reinsurance industry losses from the recent chemical explosion at the Chinese port facilities of Tianjin could reach as high as $1.5 billion, according to analysts at Credit Suisse. Meanwhile Fitch Ratings later said that there is a chance the insured loss could pass that level.

5. ILS market growth should not be at the expense of discipline, S&P warns
   Continued and future growth of the insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bond and alternative reinsurance capital market should not come at the expense of discipline, warns rating agency Standard & Poor’s.

6. Retrocession market exposed to collateral lock-up risk: Validus Re CEO
   The retrocessional reinsurance market could become volatile after a major industry loss event, as the amount of fully-collateralized cover in that market might result in a considerable amount of global retro capacity being locked up.

7. CATCo adds two to reinsurance and retro underwriting team
   Bermuda-located CATCo Investment Management, the reinsurance and retrocessional reinsurance linked investment and fund manager, has added two new senior underwriting hires, as it builds out its team in advance of the 2016 renewals.

8. Quantedge adds two to insurance-linked investments team
   Singapore based institutional asset manager Quantedge has added two new hires to its insurance-linked investments team, as the manager looks to build on its insurance-linked securities (ILS) analytical capabilities.

9. Prudential reinsures $2.9B of longevity risk for Legal & General
   One of the subsidiaries of Prudential Financial Inc. has entered into a new longevity reinsurance arrangement with UK-based insurer Legal & General Group, covering $2.9 billion of its pension liabilities against the risk of longevity improvements.

10. Connecting the capital to the risk is the challenge for ILS: Tony Ursano
    The influx of alternative, or third-party capital continuing to enter the global reinsurance space has driven an increase in the research and development of how to more closely connect capital with risks, according to TigerRisk President, Tony Ursano.

This is by no means every article published on Artemis during the last week, just the most popular, some of which were published over a week ago. There were 23 new articles published in the last week. To ensure you always stay up to date with Artemis and never miss a story subscribe to our weekly email newsletter which is delivered every Wednesday.

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Artemis’ Q2 2015 Catastrophe Bond & ILS Market Report – Keeping up with demand

We’ve now published our Q2 2015 catastrophe bond & ILS market report.

This report reviews the catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) market at the end of the second-quarter of 2015, looking at the $3.162 billion of new risk capital issued and the composition of the cat bond & ILS transactions completed during Q2 2015.

Download your copy here.