TransRe Capital Partners grows sidecar assets to $500m

TransRe Capital Partners, the unit of reinsurance firm TransRe formed in 2013 to deal with its third-party capital market activities, now has approximately $500 million in its collateralised reinsurance sidecar, according to Alleghany President Weston Hicks.

Explaining TransRe’s participation in the non-traditional reinsurance market, Hicks reveals that the Pangaea collateralised reinsurance sidecar series has grown to around the half a billion mark, while the reinsurer also leverages alternative capital for its own retrocessional needs as well.

“TransRe Capital Partners now manages approximately $500 million in sidecar support, and places a significant amount of business through retrocessions with third party capital providers,” Hicks explained.

TransRe sponsored the first Pangaea reinsurance sidecar in 2010, Pangaea Reinsurance I Ltd., as it began to utilise more third-party capital in a more proactively managed way, rather than purely as retrocession.

It followed up with Pangaea Reinsurance II Ltd., Pangaea Reinsurance III Ltd. and Pangaea Reinsurance IV Ltd., before breaking the convention to launch Pangaea Reinsurance IX Ltd. in mid-2014.

Most recently, towards the end of 2014, TransRe registered a special purpose insurer in Bermuda, named more simply Pangaea Reinsurance Ltd., through which it now issues series of notes to investors, which saves on registering new vehicles each time it sponsors a new set of sidecar notes.

Alongside this, TransRe Capital Partners is also responsible for retrocessions placed with third-party capital providers, reflecting the increasing reliance that this reinsurer is placing on the capital markets, perhaps finding third-party capital more efficient than its own balance-sheet in some cases.

For more details on reinsurance sidecar investments and transactions view our list of collateralized reinsurance sidecars.