Archive for April, 2017

Stone Ridge Asset Management, the beta and alternative risk premia focused mutual fund manager, has reached $5.5 billion of insurance-linked securities (ILS) and reinsurance linked assets under management, with its Reinsurance Risk Premium Interval Fund leading the way with 23% growth in the last quarter.

U.S. mutual fund manager Pioneer Investments has seen a significant increase in assets under management of its Pioneer ILS Interval Fund insurance-linked securities and reinsurance linked investment strategy, with the fund’s AuM jumping 52% to $245 million by the end of January 2017.

U.S. primary military mutual insurer USAA is back once again in the catastrophe bond market, with what will be the company’s 29th securitization of insurance risk, seeking a $300 million source of multi-peril collateralized reinsurance coverage through a Residential Reinsurance 2017 Ltd. (Series 2017-1) issuance.

Insurers have already reported AU$306 million (US$235m) of claims due to damage from tropical cyclone Debbie, with 28,000 individual cases reported across northern and south-easter Queensland and New South Wales.

Bermuda-headquartered ILS management, servicing, transformation and fronting specialist Horseshoe Group has joined the Bermuda Stock Exchange (BSX) as a listing sponsor, through its Horseshoe Corporate Services Ltd. unit.

RMS, the catastrophe risk modelling and analytics firm, has hired Colin Kerley as senior vice president, platform solutions. Kerley will bring experience from prior reinsurance industry roles, including on the insurance-linked securities (ILS) side, to his work with RMS market and product development teams.

Our latest report on the catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) market has now been published. The report, ‘Q1 2017 Catastrophe Bond & ILS Market Report – More records drive further growth’, analyses another record first-quarter with $2.76 billion of issuance resulting in a new record market size of $27.19 billion.

Global Parametrics, the parametric and index-based risk transfer start-up has secured the rest of its initial financing round, with a £7.9 million investment from the UK Government’s Department for International Development (DFID).

State Farm has again secured its latest catastrophe bond coverage through a privately placed issuance of a $300 million Merna Re Ltd. (Series 2017-1) transaction, securing a renewed source of earthquake reinsurance protection from the capital markets.

Capital markets reinsurance players, so insurance-linked securities (ILS) fund managers and investors, maintained an “aggressive posture” on price at the recent April renewals, according to broker Willis Re, as ILS capacity continues to demonstrate its cost-efficiency.