hurricane Irma 2017

The CCRIF SPC (formerly the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility) is set to payout $13.6 million to the Turks & Caicos islands, after their parametric hurricane wind insurance policy was triggered by hurricane Irma’s recent devastating path through the Caribbean.

As the magnitude of hurricane Irma’s impact to catastrophe bonds and the size of the eventual insurance and reinsurance loss became clearer yesterday, cat bond fund managers have reduced their expectation of suffering a major loss, with now just a handful of bonds thought most at risk.

Irma is set to be a material loss for the insurance and reinsurance industry, with ILS markets anticipating one of the most significant events to hit the sector, said David Priebe, talking to Artemis on the Sunday morning of the Rendez-Vous event in Monaco.

AIR Worldwide has reduced its estimate for insurance and reinsurance industry losses from hurricane Irma’s impacts in the United States, putting it in a range from $20 billion to $40 billion.

The talk of the morning is one of stabilising property reinsurance pricing following the impacts of hurricanes Harvey and Irma in the last fortnight, with some analysts even suggesting a little localised firming in specific pockets of the market.

Hurricane Irma slammed into Florida on Sunday as a Category 4 storm with 130 mph winds, hitting the Florida Keys first before making a second landfall on the southwest coast of the Peninsula. Coastal flooding from storm surge has been reported on both coastlines, including areas such as the Miami Brickell district.

The potential impact of major hurricane Irma, which now has Category 3 status and 130 mph+ winds as it tracks towards Florida, could be a test of the permanence of third-party capital in the global reinsurance sector, according to Standard & Poor’s (S&P).

Catastrophe risk modeling firm AIR Worldwide said that combined insurance losses for Hurricane Irma for the United States and some islands in the Caribbean will range from $20 billion to $65 Billion, with the U.S. likely to suffer up to $50 billion of the toll.

The market for live cat (live catastrophe) trading and protection buying saw a little activity yesterday, as hurricane Irma continued its approach towards Florida, with at least one trade completed with an industry loss trigger of $80 billion reported to Artemis this morning, and a few other deals getting done.

As major hurricane Irma continues to track west and the forecast path for the storm predicts the expected turn to the north towards Florida will be later, resulting in the landfall position shifting west, the potential impact to the ILS and catastrophe bond market lessens, according to Ben Brookes RMS Vice President of Capital Markets […]