Best of Artemis, week ending 1st April 2018

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending 1st April 2018, 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 or get our email alerts for every article we publish.

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Ten most viewed articles on Artemis.bm, week ending 1st April 2018:

1. Re/insurers face challenges as they spend their way into the future
   Insurance and reinsurance companies face a conundrum. Driven by their need to modernise, innovate, digitalise and generally shift towards technology driven risk transfer business models, re/insurers are spending increasing amounts of money, causing their expenses and costs to rise as a result.

2. XL wasn’t expensive, positions AXA for insurance market change: AXA CEO
   The acquisition of XL Group was not the expensive option for insurance giant AXA, according to the firms CEO Thomas Buberl, who said that the company had a number of potential acquisition targets on the table which had more expensive valuations.

3. Risk to pandemic cat bond creeps up as Lassa fever deaths rise in Nigeria
   The number of confirmed deaths from the Lassa fever outbreak in Nigeria has risen according to the latest information available from the World Health Organisation (WHO), which means that the risk posed to investors in the World Bank’s pandemic swaps and catastrophe bonds has crept up slightly.

4. SoftBank closing on Swiss Re, Chaucer & Aspen on the block
   It’s M&A season in insurance and reinsurance with seemingly nobody being safe from the searching eyes of an investor or acquirer and things are moving apace, with a number of deals on the table and likely more discussions going on behind closed doors.

5. Business as usual is not sustainable, says Lloyd’s Chairman
   If you thought that the Lloyd’s of London insurance and reinsurance market had changed in the last decade, it’s likely nothing compared to the change we will see over the coming years, as the world’s oldest re/insurance market accepts the fact its model has become unsustainable.

6. ILS fund performance split in February, as loss adjustments bite
   Insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bonds and collateralized reinsurance funds saw divergent performance during the month of February, as a number saw their performance hit as they were required to make adjustments to prior month loss estimates during the period.

7. ILS central to keeping UK re/insurance at “cutting edge” – Government
   Insurance-linked securities (ILS) are central to keeping the UK’s insurance and reinsurance industry “at the cutting edge”, the Government says, and the work to bring the recently introduced ILS legislation in the UK is an example of how industry and Government can collaborate, to the benefit of the economy.

8. 2018 a good time to enter ILS, or increase allocations: Mercer’s Howie
   Insurance-linked securities (ILS) remain an attractive and diversifying asset class, and with returns now expected to be higher following 2017 catastrophe events and the subsequent impact on reinsurance industry pricing, Mercer’s Robert Howie suggests investors should look to the space in 2018.

9. UK wants China to use its new ILS framework for catastrophe bonds
   The United Kingdom government has been courting China and trying to encourage the country to look towards the UK and its recently enacted insurance-linked securities (ILS) regulatory and tax framework as a vehicle to help China and its entities gain access to greater disaster insurance or reinsurance protection.

10. MS&AD’s Akibare Re 2018 cat bond secures $320m at lowest pricing
    Japanese insurance group MS&AD Insurance Group Holdings looks set to secure a new $320 million source of capital markets backed reinsurance protection at efficient pricing, as its latest catastrophe bond, the Akibare Re Ltd. (Series 2018-1) deal, secures the maximum targeted size at the lowest targeted pricing level.

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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