Archive for July, 2012

Reinsurance broker Aon Benfield has released its June Global Catastrophe Recap report today and the data shows that severe weather in the U.S. last month is likely to result in around $2 billion of insurance losses. That’s just at the latest estimates and there are a number of events which are likely to see increases […]

Munich Re’s latest catastrophe bond Queen Street VI Re Ltd. is getting closer to completion and we now have some more details on the expected size of the transaction and the pricing of the notes. Their sixth Queen Street cat bond, this latest deal see’s Munich Re looking for a fully collateralized source of reinsurance […]

The first-half of 2012 was the second most active such period of insurance-linked securities and catastrophe bonds issuance since 2007. The approximately $3.6 billion of newly issued ILS, predominantly cat bonds, in the first-half is evidence of insurers, reinsurers and investors all showing their commitment to the ILS market, says reinsurer Swiss Re in its […]

We’ve reported regularly on the influx of capital from investors such as hedge funds into the reinsurance market via both traditional reinsurance start-ups and non-traditional instruments such as catastrophe bonds. Now the reinsurance market has another $500m of capital to help temper rates from the launch of Bermuda based SAC Re. The reinsurer launched yesterday […]

Reinsurer Swiss Re has begun marketing their latest insurance-linked security transaction and this time it’s a deal that the wider ILS investment market should appreciate as it’s a diversifying opportunity and a life transaction. Swiss Re are bringing their latest Vita Capital mortality-linked catastrophe bond to market, their fifth such transaction, being issued through a […]

The success of Property Claims Services (PCS) industry-loss index and its usage in the catastrophe bond sector is highlighted in a report published today by PCS which discusses the cat bond market in the first-half of 2012. The PCS index has become one of the dominant trigger types used in the catastrophe bond market with […]

The 1st July reinsurance renewals season saw subdued price changes as ample capital and capacity moderated pricing pressures through the second quarter of the year, says Guy Carpenter, the reinsurance brokers, latest quarterly reinsurance market report. Inflows of alternative and non-traditional reinsurance capital, from sources such as capital market investors and hedge funds have been […]

While the U.S. east coast has been experiencing temperatures much higher than normal, severe storms have caused damage in Virginia, wildfires raged in Colorado and drought struck other areas of the U.S., the UK has been experiencing the wettest start to summer in many years. Breaking climate records seems to be a regular thing around […]

During the first six months of 2012 catastrophe bonds have continued to play an important, and growing, role in the property catastrophe risk transfer market, says a latest quarterly reinsurance market report published today by broker Guy Carpenter. The year to date has seen particularly robust issuance levels of new cat bonds and so far […]

Our regular readers will be aware that we’ve been following the unseasonal price rises in the secondary catastrophe bond market with interest. Outstanding cat bonds have seen price returns continue to rise well into the U.S. hurricane season which is very unusual. Here’s our latest fortnightly look at the Swiss Re Cat Bond Performance Indices […]