Beazley secures the biggest cyber cat bond so far, as PoleStar Re 2026-1 priced at $300m

Beazley, the London headquartered specialty insurance and reinsurance company, have successfully priced the PoleStar Re Ltd. (Series 2026-1) issuance to become the biggest cyber catastrophe bond so far, as the new deal will now provide the company $300 million of reinsurance protection, Artemis has learned.

Beazley returned to the catastrophe bond market for this fourth takedown under PoleStar Re last month, as the company looked to access more layered multi-year cyber reinsurance protection from the capital markets, through sponsorship of a new multi-tranche cyber cat bond issuance.

The initial target was to secure $200 million or more in excess-of-loss cyber reinsurance protection from the capital markets with this PoleStar Re 2026-1 catastrophe bond issuance.

As we reported in a first update on this deal, all three tranches that were offered increased in size, with Beazley then seeking $280 million of coverage from its latest cyber cat bond, while at the same time the pricing fell.

Now, we’ve learned from sources that Beazley increased one of the tranches again and has successfully priced the PoleStar Re 2026-1 cyber cat bond to provide it $300 million of protection, making this the largest cyber deal issued so far.

At the same time the pricing for all three tranches of notes came in below the initial guidance mid-points, or below guidance in the case of one of the tranches.

Which means this new catastrophe bond is set to more than double the soon to mature cyber reinsurance limit from Beazley’s first 144A cyber cat bond deal, the $140 million PoleStar Re 2024-1.

Read about all of Beazley’s catastrophe bonds in our Deal Directory.

With this new cat bond now priced it is confirmed that PoleStar Re Ltd., the Bermuda based special purpose insurer (SPI), will issue and sell $300 million of notes across three tranches of Series 2026-1 cyber cat bonds, that will provide Beazley with cyber reinsurance coverage on an indemnity trigger and per-occurrence basis, over three years through to the end of 2028.

What was at first a $75 million Class A tranche of notes were then offered at $120 million in size, but we are now told have upsized again and been priced to provide the company $140 million of protection. These notes have an initial expected loss of 0.82% and were first offered with price guidance in a range from 7% to 8%, but that declined to a spread of 7% which is where the final pricing was fixed.

What was at first a $75 million Class B tranche of notes upsized to $100 million in size. These notes have an initial expected loss of 1.31%. They were first offered with price guidance in a range from 8.75% to 9.75%, which then narrowed to between 9% and 9.25% and we’re told have now priced for a spread of 9% to be paid to investors.

The final originally $50 million Class C tranche of notes upsized to $60 million, we understand. These notes come with an initial expected loss of 2.05%. They were first offered with price guidance in a range from 10.75% to 11.75%, which later fell to between 10.5% and 10.75% and have now priced for a risk interest spread of 10.5%.

So Beazley has now secured the largest cyber catastrophe bond to be issued so far at attractive pricing, as cat bond investors demonstrated their growing comfort with cyber as a peril and that the capital markets are an efficient and viable alternative for cyber catastrophe excess-of-loss reinsurance protection.

You can read all about this PoleStar Re Ltd. (Series 2026-1)  catastrophe bond transaction in our Deal Directory, where you can analyse details of almost every cat bond ever issued and filter the list by peril to show only cyber cat bonds.