asia pacific

Reinsurance companies in the Asia Pacific region can leverage insurance-linked securities (ILS) and alternative capital to capture hardening market opportunities and become more competitive with their global peers, rating agency AM Best has advised.

To the reinsurance and insurance-linked securities (ILS) market, earthquake risk is one of the biggest peril threats in the world and one that the market can’t be complacent about, according to Paul Wilson, Head of Non-Life Analytics at Securis Investment Partners.

After several years of rate and term improvements, notably in the property catastrophe arena, there are signs the market is levelling off. But generally, returns in the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market remain attractive, according to industry experts.

If Singapore and Hong Kong are able to establish themselves as valuable domiciles for insurance-linked securities (ILS) business, it should spur local reinsurers to develop capabilities as the investor base swells in tandem.

The impact and subsequent loss creep from typhoon Jebi in Japan in 2018 caught many insurance-linked securities (ILS) investors by surprise, but the eventual deviation from initial vendor model loss estimates doesn’t translate to a fundamental issue with the models themselves, say industry experts.

Knowledge and understanding of the insurance-linked securities (ILS) asset class is on the rise in Asia, and while local expertise is a real benefit, it’s also vitally important to communicate early and persistently with the investor base, according to industry experts.

The fragmentation of the Asia region means that for insurance-linked securities (ILS) managers, it’s more practical to focus on the locations with the more mature and larger institutional market, according to Timothy Yip, Executive Director at ILS Advisers.

Insurers operating in the Asia Pacific region need increasing amounts of reinsurance protection following a series of costly catastrophe years and the COVID-19 pandemic, but they should look broadly at both traditional and alternative forms to secure the most efficient protection in the hardening market environment, according to rating agency S&P.

Paul Schultz, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Aon Securities, expects to see different types of sponsors increasingly enter the insurance-linked securities (ILS) marketplace in Asia and also around the globe.

The trend of insured against uninsured losses across the Asia Pacific region is not sustainable, and the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market will need to play an integral role in addressing the issue, according to Paul Schultz, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Aon Securities.