capital markets

Insurance-linked securities (ILS) funds reported a narrower range of performance in November 2021, as a quieter month led to an average positive return of 0.25% for the ILS fund market, according to the Eurekahedge ILS Advisers Index.

Alternative reinsurance capital levels in the global industry grew 3.7% over the course of 2021, outpacing the 2.7% growth of traditional reinsurance industry capital, according to the latest estimate from broker Guy Carpenter and rating agency AM Best.

MS Amlin has returned to the capital markets for a repeat of its landmark Asian property catastrophe risk collateralised reinsurance sidecar arrangement, with a $37.5 million issuance of Series 2022-1 notes through newly established Singapore SPV Phoenix 2 Re Pte. Ltd.

A long-standing pension investor in insurance-linked securities (ILS), the Pennsylvania Public School Employees’ Retirement System (PSERS) is planning a withdrawal from the sector, as part of a planned divestment of all absolute return strategies.

Insurance origination and distribution specialist Amwins has highlighted how unusual the hard market in property risks is at this time, especially for catastrophe exposed properties, as rather than a lack of capital driving rates higher, it is risk aversion that is driving harder rates.

Ledger Investing, the insurance technology (insurtech) and insurance-linked securities (ILS) focused company, said that over the course of 2021 it placed more than $300 million of gross premium directly into the capital markets, as it continued to build out its risk securitization platform.

This December marks the 25th anniversary, or silver jubilee, of the issuance of a landmark catastrophe bond transaction, the George Town Re Ltd. deal, since when Artemis has tracked almost $135 billion of cat bond issuance.

Carrie Lam, Chief Executive of the Government of Hong Kong, sees “enormous potential” for catastrophe bonds and insurance-linked securities (ILS) to provide important disaster risk capital to underpin risks in the Greater Bay Area.

As we’ve been documenting in recent weeks during our normal coverage of every new issuance, there is clear evidence that catastrophe bond funds and investors are holding the line on pricing in recent weeks, with more recently priced cat bond tranches seeing their coupons rise, rather than fall.

Aspen Insurance Holdings Limited, the Bermuda headquartered insurance and reinsurance underwriter, has announced a range of changes to its senior leadership across underwriting, reinsurance and its Bermuda operation, including adding a new Group CUO role.