Best of Artemis, week ending 6th December 2020

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending 6th December 2020, 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 or get our email alerts for every article we publish.

Ten most read articles on Artemis.bm, week ending 6th December 2020:

1. Alphabet (Google) returns for second cat bond to top up quake cover
   Alphabet, Inc. has returned to the catastrophe bond market in very quick succession to add a second $95 million cat bond transaction, clearly pleased with the pricing and execution of its first.
2. Swiss Re sets up its first ILS fund, the Core Nat Cat Fund under 1863 Fund Ltd.
   Global reinsurance firm Swiss Re continues to demonstrate its growing commitment to third-party sources of capital and insurance-linked securities (ILS), announcing a dedicated ILS fund, the Core Nat Cat Fund.
3. AXA XL reducing nat cat exposure, making active use of retrocession
   AXA XL is targeting a reduction in its natural catastrophe exposure over the coming years, as it looks to bring its business results to a sustainable and profitable level.
4. Vantage Risk launches, to build out ILS capabilities to drive growth
   Vantage Risk has now launched and revealed a strategy that includes building out insurance-linked securities (ILS) capabilities to drive growth of the company.
5. Breaking down catastrophe bond & ILS issuance by year
   We’ve developed a new chart with which you can analyse catastrophe bond and related insurance-linked securities (ILS) issuance by type of transaction and year.
6. Turker Re launches Capital Solutions unit & Turkey quake ILW product
   Turker Re has launched a new product offering of a Turkey earthquake industry loss warranty (ILW) as the first under a new Capital Solutions unit.
7. Liberty Mutual sponsoring first cat bond since 2012, with $200m Mystic Re IV
   Insurance giant Liberty Mutual has returned to the catastrophe bond market for the first time since 2012, as the company seeks a $200 million source of catastrophe reinsurance from the capital markets.
8. Early retro renewals suggest “significantly better expected returns” – KBW
   Some of the earlier and larger retrocessional reinsurance programs in the market have received their firm orders or are completed, with indications that suggest rates are increasing even for some of the largest and most respected reinsurers in the market, suggesting much better returns are available for writing this business.
9. ILS Capital’s Prospero Re approved to write collateralized & traditional reinsurance
   ILS Capital Management Ltd. has now received approval from the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) for an expansion of the operating model of its reinsurance company Prospero Re Ltd., which can now write both fully collateralized and traditional reinsurance with an element of leverage.
10. Catastrophe bond spreads back at their highest since 2012/13
    Artemis’ data on the catastrophe bond market shows that excess spreads, so the return available above expected loss, of new issuance so far in 2020 is now back at levels last seen in 2012/13.

This is not every article published on Artemis during the last week, just the most popular, some of which were published over a week ago. There were 32 new articles published in the last week. To ensure you always stay up to date with Artemis and never miss a story subscribe to our weekly email newsletter which is delivered every Wednesday.

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