Cat bond manager Icosa Investments launched by Steiger & Nickerson

Icosa Investments has been launched as new catastrophe bond focused asset manager, by co-founders the former Twelve Capital executive Florian Steiger and Swiss financial services and capital markets specialist Jordan Nickerson, Artemis has learned.

Established in Switzerland, Icosa Investments will offer strategies focused on catastrophe bonds, we understand, aiming to bring uncorrelated sources of return to its investors.

The company already has strategic backing from prominent industry partners and relationships with key investors, aiming to capitalise on the growing interest in alternative investment strategies and the success of the cat bond market.

Icosa Investments is largely owned by its employees, we understand.

Already, the new cat bond investment manager has secured what it calls “a significant financial investment” from a client, which it says underscores a “robust financial foundation and promising future.”

Florian Steiger, was recently the Head of Cat Bonds at insurance-linked securities (ILS) and reinsurance asset manager Twelve Capital, but departed the firm at the end of 2023.

At Twelve Capital, Steiger was responsible for the catastrophe bond portfolio during a period of significant growth for the company, building that strategy to become one of the largest in the industry.

Steiger will be the CEO of Icosa Investments and presumably responsible for management of its cat bond portfolios.

Jordan Nickerson will be responsible for Relationship Management at Icosa Investments.

He spent seven years as a relationship manager and Fund Advisor at Cape Capital, a Swiss multi-family office with several billion in client assets under management.

Before that, Nickerson was the Head of Global Growth at DealMarket, a financial technology company that helped modernise deal flow management for different asset classes, such as private equity and venture capital.

Commenting on the launch of Icosa Investments, CEO Florian Steiger said, “Our mission is to generate superior risk-adjusted returns for our investors.

“We focus solely on investment strategies that either exhibit uncorrelated returns or which provide significant return enhancements over traditional fixed income instruments. We only provide a service when we believe that our investments process offers a superior investment experience to funds already available in the market.”

Co-founder Jordan Nickerson added, “Icosa Investments places a great emphasis on transparency, fairness, and robustness in all our operations. We believe that our investors should have access to the same information as we do, and we uphold this principle in our communication process.”

Icosa Investments has launched a new catastrophe bond fund, named the Icosa Investment Umbrella Fund – CAT Bond Fund, which appears to be a Liechtenstein fund and a UCITS strategy.

“As with my previous mandates, the Icosa Cat Bond UCITS strategy will be positioned with a market-like risk profile, as this continues to offer the optimal balance between risk and return for most investors,” Steiger explained.

Icosa has been launched in collaboration with MRB Fund Partners AG, an established Swiss asset manager. All regulated portfolio management activities for Icosa will be carried out through MRB Fund Partners AG.

Icosa itself will serve as a sub-distributor in Switzerland.

It’s good to see a new investment manager launching with a focus on the catastrophe bond space, as more choice is always beneficial for investors.

Given the growth and strong performance of the cat bond market in 2023, this an opportune moment in the market’s history to launch a new specialist asset manager and it will be interesting to watch Icosa Investments business develop over the coming years.