What is Catastrophe Bond?

Question

What is Catastrophe Bond?

Answer 1

Catastrophe bonds (also known as cat bonds) are risk-linked securities that transfer a specified set of risks from a sponsor to investors. They are often structured as floating rate corporate bonds whose principal is forgiven if specified trigger conditions are met. They are typically used by insurers as an alternative to traditional catastrophe reinsurance.

For example, if an insurer has built up a portfolio of risks by insuring properties in Florida, then it might wish to pass some of this risk on so that it can remain solvent after a large hurricane. It could simply purchase traditional catastrophe reinsurance, which would pass the risk on to reinsurers. Or it could sponsor a cat bond, which would pass the risk on to investors. In consultation with an investment bank, it would create a special purpose entity that would issue the cat bond.

Investors would buy the bond, which might pay them a coupon of LIBOR plus a spread, generally (but not always) between 3 and 20%. If no hurricane hit Florida, then the investors would make a healthy return on their investment. But if a hurricane were to hit Florida and trigger the cat bond, then the principal initially paid by the investors would be forgiven, and instead used by the sponsor to pay its claims to policyholders.

Michael Moriarty, Deputy Superintendant of the New York State Insurance Department, has been at the forefront of state regulatory efforts to have U.S. regulators encourage the development of insurance securitizations through cat bonds in the United States instead of off-shore, through encouraging two different methods — protected cells and special purpose reinsurance vehicles.

In August 2007 Michael Lewis, the author of Liar's Poker and Moneyball, wrote an article about catastrophe bonds that appeared in The New York Times Magazine, entitled "In Nature's Casino."