Catastrophe bond news

A number of aggregate catastrophe bonds have already seen their annual deductibles severely eroded by previous catastrophes and with this weekend’s severe weather activity in the United States providing a reminder of the tornado threat, cat bond fund manager Icosa Investments has cautioned investors to assess the risk of certain deals wisely.

Perry Thomas, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Flood Re, has announced the successful completion of the company’s debut catastrophe bond, the £140 million London Bridge 2 PCC Limited (Vision 2039 – 2025-1) issuance, stating that it represents an “innovative transaction” that strengthens the firm’s reinsurance programme and enhances protection for UK households against flooding.

AXIS Capital, the global specialty insurance and reinsurance underwriter, has now successfully priced its latest catastrophe bond issuance, securing the 33% upsized $200 million in North American named storm and earthquake protection from the Northshore Re II Ltd. (Series 2025-1) issuance, Artemis has learned.

Here are the ten most popular news articles, week ending March 16th 2025, 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.

US primary insurer Allstate has now successfully priced its latest catastrophe bond transaction, securing the upsized 150% target of $750 million of collateralized multi-peril and multi-year catastrophe reinsurance protection from the Sanders Re II Ltd. (Series 2025-1) issuance, which marks the company’s joint-largest cat bond sponsorship ever.

Core Specialty Insurance Holdings, Inc. has increased the target size for its new Yosemite Re Ltd. (Series 2025-1) catastrophe bond, with now up to $95 million of catastrophe reinsurance sought from the deal which, like its first, will cover its StarStone US entities to begin.

According to a new report from King Ridge Capital Advisors (KRCA), catastrophe bonds are offering more opportunities for bond and multi-asset fund managers to diversify their portfolios, reduce correlations and improve risk-adjusted returns.

Sven Althoff, Member of the Executive Board for Property & Casualty (P&C) of large European reinsurer Hannover Re said this morning that catastrophe bonds have been the main area of expansion for the company within the insurance-linked securities (ILS) space, noting that it is a “nicely growing part” of the firm’s business.

Fidelis is set to benefit from a roughly $98 million additional retrocessional reinsurance recovery from its aggregate industry-index trigger Herbie Re Ltd. (Series 2021-1) catastrophe bond, as losses from the California wildfires, added to those from hurricanes Helene and Milton earlier in the risk period, have eaten into the remaining principal of these notes.

The Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP), a large Canadian institutional retirement fund, has expanded its investment allocation to insurance-linked securities (ILS) by approximately 39% in 2024, lifting its investments in the ILS market to approximately US $1.32 billion.