Cat bond news

Hong Kong’s Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Christopher Hui explained today that the government aims to enhance its preferential tax regime and extend the eligible asset classes for tax exemptions to include insurance-linked securities (ILS), such as catastrophe bonds.

Third-party investor capital under management in RenaissanceRe Capital Partners range of reinsurance joint-ventures and insurance-linked securities strategies reached a new all-time high of just over $9 billion at the end of 2025, before dropping slightly as 2026 began and the manager returned profits to some investors.

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending March 1st 2026, 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.

Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance Co. Ltd., the Japanese primary insurance group, is back in the catastrophe bond market to sponsor an initially $100 million Kizuna Re III Pte. Ltd. (Series 2026-1) transaction, that is designed to provide collateralized earthquake reinsurance protection and is being issued out of Singapore, Artemis has learned.

The insurance-linked securities (ILS) market has entered 2026 with significant momentum, driven by an unprecedented surge in catastrophe bond issuance and strong global demand for protection. SCOR Investment Partners believes this robust primary activity will play a critical role in sustaining current spread levels across the market throughout the year.

Lumen Re’s, successful sponsorship of its first Rule 144A catastrophe bond, the $175 million Photon Re Ltd. (Series 2026-1) issuance, represents a natural evolution of the firm’s risk‑transfer strategy, and marks an important strengthening of its overall risk framework, CUO Klaus Sapelza said today.

The secondary market for catastrophe bonds alternated between extended periods of low trading volume and flurries of more active turnover in 2025. However, according to Swiss Re Capital Markets, the market remained relatively “bid-heavy” throughout the majority of the year, with limited offers and tightening spreads reflecting a sellers’ market characterised by excess capacity.

In 2026, American Integrity Insurance feels that renewed flexibility in the catastrophe bond market and attractive pricing environment is creating good opportunities for the company, with its senior executives citing the ability to attach reinsurance cover lower down and the return of some cascading features.

Bruce Lucas, the CEO of Slide Insurance Company, said today that the firm’s new $320 million Purple Re Ltd. (Series 2026-1) catastrophe bond came in with risk-adjusted pricing that was down more than 20% year-on-year, while his company expects to benefit from more reinsurance synergies as it has ambitious expansion plans.

The International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA) will be sending proposals to the Government of India regarding the regulator’s suggested framework that would allow re/insurers to set up reinsurance sidecars in a special purpose insurance (SPI) structure, Chairman K. Rajaraman announced at the Global Conference of Actuaries 2026 earlier this week.