Archive for April, 2012

According to reinsurance broker Guy Carpenter, in their just published April renewals report, they have noticed ceding insurers in Japan increasingly evaluating the capital markets as a potential alternative or supplemental source of risk transfer capacity. April renewals are particularly important for Japanese insurers as this is the main reinsurance renewal season for the Asia […]

Reinsurer Swiss Re have published a press release discussing their role in the recently completed Blue Danube Ltd. catastrophe bond. Swiss Re Capital Markets, the arm of Swiss Re who deal with capital markets structuring and placement, acted as an arranger/structurer and also bookrunner on the transaction, which provides German insurer Allianz with three years […]

Bermuda based Validus Holdings has joined forces with U.S. hedge fund manager John Paulson and his Paulson & Co. hedge fund to launch a new Bermudian Class 4 reinsurer called PαCRe, Ltd. PαCRe, Ltd. will have an initial capitalisation of $500m to write reinsurance and launches in time for the 1st June mid-year renewals. PαCRe, […]

Insurer Allianz has issued a press release providing their thoughts on the recent completion of their Blue Danube Ltd. catastrophe bond deal. Blue Danube Ltd. provides Allianz with a fully collateralized source of cover for multiple perils on a per-occurrence basis using a modelled industry loss trigger for a three year period. Allianz is not […]

Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, a non-profit insurer of last resort for residential and commercial property owners in the state of Louisiana, now benefits from catastrophe bond cover for the first time. The Pelican Re Ltd. catastrophe bond which they sponsored priced and completed and the notes have now been listed on the Cayman Islands […]

Right on schedule Colorado State University hurricane forecasters Klotzbach & Gray have published their first proper forecast for the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season. They released a pre-forecast discussion a few weeks ago in which they predicted the forecast would be for a below average season, now they have released their full forecast along with numbers […]

It is testament to the growing profile of insurance-linked securities and catastrophe bonds as an alternative investment opportunity with attractive non-correlated returns when you hear of more mainstream investors looking seriously at an allocation to the space. It’s not that unusual for pension funds to be interested, in fact they are fast becoming one of […]

We’ve heard some very interesting news this morning from a contact; Florida’s Citizens Property Insurance, the state backed property insurer of last resort, is said to be bringing its first catastrophe bond to market through an entity called Everglades Re Ltd. We’ve been waiting for a Florida Citizens cat bond to appear since January when […]

PERILS AG, the independent Zurich-based company providing industry-wide European catastrophe insurance data and loss indices,has published an updated loss estimate for European windstorm Andrea which hit western Europe on the 4th and 5th of January 2012, impacting Germany, UK, France, Benelux and Switzerland. The initial loss estimate that PERILS gave this storm back in February […]

One of the catastrophe bonds which has been doing the rounds on its marketing phase and has recently completed, Blue Danube Ltd., has had its credit ratings assigned by rating agency Standard & Poor’s. The Blue Danube Ltd. Series 2012-1 transaction has been issued by the Bermuda domiciled SPV on behalf of sponsor Allianz Argos […]