Investments

The impacts of the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic will be felt broadly across the global reinsurance marketplace, but in the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market the effects may drive a reduction in available ILS capacity and trapping of collateral, Darren Redhead, CEO of Lancashire Capital Management said today. Speaking during the quarterly earnings call for parent company…

The latest catastrophe bond to be sponsored by reinsurance firm Swiss Re has been successfully upsized 7.5% at pricing, we can reveal, with the Matterhorn Re Ltd. (Series 2020-3) transaction now set to secure the company $215 million of U.S. named storm retrocession. At the same time, the pricing for the now two-tranche issuance has…

The average return of insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bond and reinsurance linked investment funds fell to a negative -0.65% in March 2020, as the significant selling pressure experienced in the secondary cat bond market drove returns down for the month. March’s -0.65% average ILS fund return is the second worst performance for the month on…

The California Wildfire Fund, which was established last year to back some of the wildfire liabilities related to utilities operating in the state, will go back to the reinsurance market to seek a renewal and an expansion of its first program for 2020 and beyond. The California Wildfire Fund was set up to provide a…

The insurance and reinsurance market looks increasingly disciplined and as a result Lancashire Holdings has taken some opportunities to grow in the first-quarter and expects this discipline to persist, driving further improvements in risk pricing, CEO Alex Maloney said today. Lancashire Holdings reported that it has set up a reserve of $35 million for potential…

The Pacific Island nation of Tonga is to receive a $4.5 million payout from its parametric disaster insurance policy with the Pacific Catastrophe Risk Insurance Company (PCRIC), the largest payout to date from the regional catastrophe insurance facility. The Pacific Catastrophe Risk Insurance Company (PCRIC) is a regional catastrophe insurance platform that provides governments of…

Markel Corporation has put some of its own money behind the running-off of its retrocessional reinsurance investment manager Markel CATCo, investing $90 million in one of the CATCo funds in the first-quarter to boost capital available to fund investor redemptions. Markel has repeatedly shown its commitment to ensuring investors in the catastrophe loss stricken Markel…

Swiss Re, the Zurich headquartered global reinsurance firm, has fallen to a group net loss of -$225 million for the first-quarter of 2020, after taking a pre-tax charge of $476 million for its property and casualty businesses due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Swiss Re has set aside a considerable reserve for the initial expected claims…

Catastrophe bond and insurance-linked security (ILS) rates-on-line were up by a huge 13% in Q1 2020 and have risen by 56% since the end of 2016, as measured by the synthetic ILS rate-on-line Index calculated by Lane Financial. It puts cat bond and ILS rates firmly in hard market territory, with the Lane Financial rate-on-line…