Archive for March, 2011

A.M. Best has announced that they are placing the $200m Topiary Capital Ltd’s Series 2008-1 Class A notes under review with developing implications in the wake of the earthquake disaster in Japan. The catastrophe bond notes, issued on behalf of Platinum Underwriters and due on August 5th 2011, were put on Creditwatch by S&P last […]

In the midst of the uncertainty surrounding the events in Japan, the catastrophe bond market will be encouraged to see the announcement from GC Securities that they have successfully helped Munich Re complete their latest catastrophe bond transaction. GC Securities have been involved in three cat bond transactions during Q1 2011.

Reinsurer Munich Re has announced its initial estimate of their claims burden from the earthquake event in Japan on March 11th. They provisionally estimate that their losses from the devastating earthquake and tsunami could total as much as €1.5 billion after retrocession and before tax.

Back in January we wrote that the government in Israel were looking seriously at catastrophe bonds as a mechanism to prepare their finances for the possible economic shock of a major earthquake. A study undertaken by their National Economic Council concluded that Israel’s government finances were not prepared for a 1 in 250 year earthquake […]

Hymans Robertson has published its Managing Pension Scheme Risk Report Q4 2010. In the report which looks at the state of the pension scheme risk management and risk transfer market they suggest that significant growth is likely over the next couple of years and beyond.

Guy Carpenter has announced that they have received a $1m grant from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) to help develop a market for weather index-based microinsurance products in Mozambique. The initiative will aim to provide cheap, affordable insurance cover for farmers in a country where the population depends on agriculture for economic subsistence.

Risk Management Solutions has issued an estimate for the economic losses resulting from the disaster in Japan on the 11th of March. Their estimate includes the earthquake, tsunami, disruption to power supplies, evacuations and the ongoing issues relating to the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The Kyoshin K-Net earthquake monitoring network in Japan was knocked offline by the huge earthquake and tsunami on the 11th March. As a result some of the data required to calculate whether any of the Japan quake exposed catastrophe bonds were triggered was not available and this has hindered efforts to calculate index values against […]

The Financial Times reported yesterday that UK pension schemes are increasingly seeking to enter into agreements to transfer the risks associated with their pension funds over to insurance companies. The common ways of achieving this risk transfer are buy-outs which involve a whole pension scheme being passed over to an insurer and buy-ins where an […]

American International Group (AIG) issued a press release late on Friday to announce the estimated catastrophe losses experienced by its property and casualty subsidiary Chartis in the first quarter 2011. Total estimated insured losses for the quarter are expected to come to around $1 billion with around $700m attributed to the Japanese earthquake and tsunami […]