Archive for November, 2014

Bermuda headquartered insurance and reinsurance group AXIS Capital is taking a slow and steady approach to building out its AXIS Re Ventures third-party and ILS capital management unit and is looking for quality over quantity in terms of investor.

A report from the London Market Group, looking at the competitive position of the London insurance and reinsurance market, finds that it is under threat and one recommendation is to embrace the rise of alternative capital to build capacity.

Insurance, reinsurance and third-party reinsurance and ILS capital management group Hiscox has continued to reduce its property catastrophe reinsurance book of business, as it seeks to navigate the challenging market with the help of new products.

John Charman, CEO of Bermuda-based re/insurer Endurance Specialty Holdings, expects challenging reinsurance market conditions to last for the foreseeable future, but believes Endurance’s strategy positions it to navigate through it.

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending 9th November 2014, 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.

U.S. primary insurer Allstate has hailed its current reinsurance program as the best coverage it’s ever had, as the availability of lower-cost ILS and alternative reinsurance capital, plus recent catastrophe bond issuances, help it to increase capital efficiencies.

Bermuda-based hedge fund strategy reinsurer Third Point Re has reported mixed results, with growing income from its ILS & catastrophe fund, continued combined ratio improvement in its reinsurance business, offset by a reduction in investment return.

Swiss Re, the second largest reinsurance firm in the world, has benefited from the low-levels of catastrophe losses in the third-quarter which helped it to beat analyst expectations in Q3 despite the continued market challenges.

The Kilimanjaro Re Ltd. (Series 2014-2) catastrophe bond, launched recently for Bermuda reinsurance firm Everest Re, reflecting strong investor demand for the ILS asset class is set to increase in size by 43% to secure the reinsurer $500m of protection.

Malta, one of the domiciles targeting the insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bond and reinsurance convergence sector, has nearly completed its new regulations which will bring together the special purpose reinsurer concept with protected cells.