With targets upsized for two 144A catastrophe bond sponsorships that are in the market at this time, the annual record for 144A cat bond issuance could now be exceeded before the end of the first-half of 2025, with close to $17.5 billion now a possible H1 issuance total, if the remaining 144A cat bonds all settle at their increased sizes.We’ve been documenting the accelerated pace of catastrophe bond issuance in 2025 and you can .We track every catastrophe bond through its offering phase so you can , to give a projection for issuance as the year progresses.As we , the second-quarter of 2025 is on-track to be the first ever $10 billion quarter of catastrophe bond issuance, across full Rule 144A cat bonds and the few private cat bond lites we’ve tracked, with the half-year record also soundly beaten.

It’s also notable that the record for any three month period of issuance in the market’s history now stands at over $11 billion, for March through May this year, based on Artemis’ data.But our data also enables tracking of the different categories of cat bond issuance we analyse, with .Issuance of Rule 144A cat bonds that have settled (so completed issuances) tracked by Artemis this year already stands at over $16.02 billion.

But, with the targeted upsizings of from Everest and Convex’s third Hypatia deal, that we covered this morning, the pipeline of deals scheduled to settle before the end of June now stands at $1.425 billion and all of those are 144A cat bonds.Meaning, if those two cat bonds achieve their upper-target sizes, first-half 2025 issuance of 144A catastrophe bonds would reach close to $17.5 billion, setting an annual record.While 144A property cat bond issuance could now reach almost $16.8 billion, again setting a new annual record.

The record issuance year of 2024 saw almost $17.24 billion of Rule 144A catastrophe bond issuance, meaning 2025 is now on-track to set a new annual record for this insurance-linked securities (ILS) structure, if sponsors achieve their top-end target deal sizes.After 2024 issuance of catastrophe bonds broke all records, had you asked anyone in the market whether that full-year record could be broken in just six months, it feels like no one would have been that bullish back in January.In fact, none of the broker-dealers we spoke with were projecting anything greater than $19 billion of issuance for the full-year.

A stunning period of catastrophe bond issuance, with to sponsors reinsurance and retrocession arrangements, now sees us looking at annual records at the mid-point of June.Quite remarkable! The way things stand, the annual record for issuance across 144A and private cat bonds that we’ve tracked won’t quite fall before the end of the first-half, but it will get very close as well.Slower private cat bond issuance in 2025 is the only reason for that.

Things could change though (these remain projections until deal’s price) and perhaps some of the cat bonds still in the market won’t get to their upper-target sizes.So we’ll need to wait and see what happens over the next week to confirm this potential new annual record for 144A cat bond issuance achieved in just half a year.It’s also worth noting that other sources may report different numbers, with some broker reports excluding certain deals, or treating a 144A closed syndication as the same as a private cat bond.

But, our methodology has been consistent for years and even if the numbers differ compared to some broker reports, their figures are also going to tell a story of a buoyant half-year for the catastrophe bond market with many records falling.Stay tuned to Artemis and we’ll keep you updated., .

(use the key of months at the bottom to include and exclude any from your analysis).The lists all catastrophe bond and related transactions completed since the market was formed in the late 1990’s.The directory also lists the cat bonds waiting to settle, which are highlighted in green at the top of the list.

.We track , the most prolific sponsors in the market, most active , which risk modellers feature in cat bonds most frequently, plus much ., or via the Artemis Dashboard which provides a handy one-page view of cat bond market metrics.

All of these are updated as soon as a new cat bond issuance is completed, or as older issuances mature..All of our Artemis Live insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bonds and reinsurance can be accessed online.

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