March 2009/1

Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) has posted a negative outlook on State Farm and RenRe’s $100mn joint venture sidecar-style transaction Top Layer Re, on the back of a recent action

Fitch Ratings has upgraded the class B notes of Fremantle – Brit Insurance’s three-year catastrophe swap deal – as the likelihood of a loss is diminishing with the risk period movin

Standard & Poor’s (S&P) has withdrawn its ratings on three bank loans issued by Emerson Re – the $500mn all-debt sidecar vehicle set up by Citadel’s CIG Re and New Castle Re in 2007

US insurer Chubb completed its $150mn East Lane Re III Florida wind indemnity cat bond earlier this month, demonstrating that the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market is open once again. Goldman

(Re)insurance broker Willis Group has developed a parametric index for offshore Gulf of Mexico (GOM) energy exposures, which it hopes will help halt the shrinking of the pool of capacity for the peri

Cat bond structurers are exploring alternative European jurisdictions for special purpose reinsurance vehicle (SPRV) incorporation, after the Irish regulator forced two re-writes of the Atlas V trans

Berkshire Hathaway’s (BH) appetite for catastrophe reinsurance has been blunted and the company will sell less in 2009 in order to protect its capital cushion, according to chairman Warren Buff

The Class A notes of Ajax Re – Aspen Insurance’s $100mn 2007 earthquake cat bond – have been placed on CreditWatch negative by ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P), as it aw