Parametric insurance news

Jamaica continues to work with the World Bank on a first catastrophe bond for the country the Finance Ministry has said and reflecting the importance of disaster risk financing, in recent weeks it has received a roughly $3.5 million payout under its parametric CCRIF insurance coverage.

Flood risk insurtech company FloodFlash, which offers an innovative sensor-based approach to support parametric flood insurance triggers, has beaten its own record on rapid claims payment, paying out to one policyholder within ten hours for the impacts of flooding during UK storm Christoph.

The World Bank has approved $500 million of funding for Indonesia to help the country enhance its financial response to natural disasters, climate risks, and health-related shocks, with the use of risk pooling, and insurance or reinsurance instruments at the heart of the plan.

Quality and availability of data is seen as vitally important by insurance and reinsurance market players interested in covering drought related risks, as they seek to reduce basis risk in offerings, a survey from VanderSat has found.

Arbol, Inc., the marketplace technology provider that supports parametric risk transfer or weather insurance and utilises smart contracts, has raised a $7 million Series A funding round to help grow its business.

Mars Incorporated, the American company which is one of the largest globally active and multinational manufacturers of food products, confectionery and pet food, has said that alternative capital is attractive to the firm as a potential backer for its captive, whole parametric risk transfer is seen as a “fantastic” risk management tool.

Zurich North America, a division of the global insurance and reinsurance firm Zurich, has launched a new product to provide insurance protection for weather related non-physical impacts to the construction industry in the United States.

The African Risk Capacity (ARC), a provider of parametric disaster insurance products to countries and now other entities in Africa, has launched a parametric tropical cyclone insurance product for African nations and Madagascar has become the first to take it up.

Descartes Underwriting, the insurance technology (insurtech) focused managing general agency (MGA) that specialises in parametric and data-driven risk transfer products, has made a key hire in Daniel Vetter who will lead the firms expansion in North America.

Tropical cyclone Yasa is making landfall in Fiji with winds estimated at close to 150 mph, threatening significant damage to the island of Vanua Levu, while the main island of Viti Levu and capital city of Suva is also being affected.