Insurance

For insurance-linked securities (ILS) contracts and structures that have exposure to potential losses from the Covid-19 corornavirus pandemic, the chances are that their capital and collateral could be trapped for a prolonged duration, executives from RenaissanceRe have suggested. Analysts from Wells Fargo Securities had discussions with reinsurance firm RenaissanceRe’s CFO Bob Qutub and other executives…

2020 looks set to be another significant year for severe convective storm losses in the United States, with the insurance and reinsurance market already on the hook for over $13 billion of costs year-to-date, with hail again a significant driver. In 2019, severe convective storms and severe weather drove almost $23 billion of insurance and…

The secondary market for catastrophe bond trading has offered some good opportunities in recent times, but with the focus now back on primary issuance, it’s an interesting moment for investors, says Stephan Ruoff of Schroder Secquaero. Ruoff, the Deputy Head of insurance-linked securities (ILS) asset manager Schroder Secquaero, a specialist division of global investment group…

The Caribbean island of St Lucia has increased its participation level in the CCRIF SPC (formerly known as the Caribbean Catastrophic Risk Insurance Facility), buying an enlarged slice of parametric disaster insurance protection for 2020. The CCRIF SPC provides parametric disaster insurance protection to Caribbean and Central American nations, covering perils including tropical storms, earthquakes,…

The Texas Windstorm Insurance Association (TWIA) has lifted its target for the recently launched Alamo Re II Pte. Ltd. (Series 2020-1) catastrophe bond issuance, with as much as $400 million of reinsurance capacity from the capital markets now on the cards. TWIA returned to the catastrophe bond market last week with a new issuance for…

Institutional investors surveyed by Eaton Partners remain focused on finding sources of relatively uncorrelated return from their alternative and private market investments, while the majority intend to stay with their allocations to alternative investments, citing a long-term focus. The long-term portfolio impact of an asset class remains key rather for limited partner investors, rather than…

Beazley, the Lloyd’s market focused specialist insurance and reinsurance underwriter, has ambitious targets for bringing significant amounts of third-party capital under its management through facilities, or beta-like market tracking structures, according to analysts. In particular, Beazley sees a huge opportunity to grow its third-party capital backed ‘smart tracker’ special purpose arrangement (SPA) syndicate 5623 significantly…

The Covid-19 pandemic is like a “live cat” for the reinsurance industry, one that will keep on driving losses, and this combined with the challenges caused by recent consecutive catastrophe loss years appears to have driven the market into a phase of “sustainable hardening,” analysts at JMP Securities have said. Having spoken with numerous insurance…