mexico

Hurricane Polo has now made landfall on the west coast of Baja California Sur, Mexico with sustained winds of 110 mph and a minimum central pressure of 965mb, at which level there is no threat to the parametric trigger of the Mexican governments $175 million IBRD CAR Mexico 2024 (Pacific) catastrophe bond.

Hurricane Polo is rapidly intensifying off the southwestern coast of Mexico and the strengthening trend is expected to continue, while the track remains uncertain at this time, which has brought the $175 million IBRD CAR Mexico 2024 (Pacific) parametric catastrophe bond into focus this week.

After a magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck just off the southern coast of Mexico on Friday, analysis suggests this event was a near-miss for attaching the parametric trigger of one tranche of notes from the country’s World Bank facilitated IBRD CAR Mexico 2024 catastrophe bond transaction.

Liberty Mutual Reinsurance (LM Re), the reinsurance arm of the insurance group, and Safehub, a provider of seismic sensor and risk management technology, have partnered to provide the Mexican federal government with a new nationwide parametric earthquake and volcanic risk insurance solution.

The government of Mexico has now finalised its main insurance protection for natural disasters and severe weather events for the coming year, doubling the size of its parametric catastrophe insurance arrangement to around US $575 million for 2026 into 2027.

According to Fitch Ratings, recent catastrophe bond and insurance risk letters (LRS) issuances within Latin America represent a strategic opportunity to expand and sophisticate the regions’ insurance debt market.

Estimated insured losses from Hurricane Erick, which struck Mexico’s Pacific coast last week, are expected to fall well bellow the US$1.97 billion insured losses from 2023’s Hurricane Otis, according to global ratings agency AM Best.

Twelve Securis, the specialist insurance-linked securities investment manager, is not anticipating any impact to the World Bank catastrophe bond or any of the firm’s private ILS positions due to losses caused by major hurricane Erick in Mexico yesterday.

Major hurricane Erick has made landfall on the coast of Mexico with 125 mph sustained winds in the state of Oaxaca and the NHC reports the minimum central pressure at 950mb, which is above the level where the World Bank facilitated $175 million IBRD CAR Mexico 2024 (Pacific) parametric catastrophe bond would be triggered.

Were major hurricane Erick to trigger the $175 million IBRD CAR Mexico 2024 (Pacific) catastrophe bond that provides disaster insurance to the Mexican government, it could reignite the debate surrounding parametric triggers, given the recency to another trigger event with hurricane Otis back in 2023, Florian Steiger of Icosa Investments has suggested.