AXIS Capital, the global specialty insurance and reinsurance underwriter, has now successfully priced its latest catastrophe bond issuance, securing the 33% upsized $200 million in North American named storm and earthquake protection from the issuance, Artemis has learned.The notes have now been priced to pay cat bond investors a spread at the bottom-end of the initial guidance range, indicating attractive execution for the sponsor.AXIS Capital for what will become its seventh issuance to-date, all of which have been under the Northshore Re branding..

Initially, AXIS Capital was seeking $150 million or more in retrocessional reinsurance from this Northshore Re II 2025-1 catastrophe bond.But, in our first update on this deal, , while the price guidance had been lowered.Now, we’ve learned that the increased size target was achieved at the reduced pricing, with this Northshore Re II 2025-1 catastrophe bond now set to provide AXIS with $200 million of retrocessional reinsurance protection for certain of the firm’s underwriting subsidiaries, including its AXIS Insurance arm, reinsurer AXIS Re, as well as its E&S company and Lloyd’s syndicates.

As a result, this new cat bond will provide AXIS and subsidiaries with $200 million of multi-year and fully-collateralized protection against losses from US named storms (inc.Puerto Rico & Virgin Islands), as well as U.S.& Canada earthquake risks, across a three year term to April 7th 2028, on a weighted industry-loss trigger and per-occurrence basis.

The $200 million in Series 2025-1 Class A notes that Northshore Re II will now issue come with an initial expected loss of 2.1%.The notes were first offered to cat bond funds and investors with price guidance in a range from 5% to 5.75%, but that was later fixed at the low-end of that range, at 5%, which is where the notes have now been priced.This new cat bond will more than replace the $140 million in cat bond protection AXIS had from its that matures around the middle of this year, although that soon-to-mature cat bond deal was an annual aggregate transaction in coverage terms, so could also get renewed if AXIS has the appetite.

It’s good to see AXIS Capital continue to place the capital markets within its retro protection arrangements, as the company looks to carve catastrophe risks out of its broader property books and transfer them to efficient sources of risk capital.You can read all about this catastrophe bond from AXIS Capital and every other cat bond deal ever issued in the extensive Artemis Deal Directory..All of our Artemis Live insurance-linked securities (ILS), catastrophe bonds and reinsurance can be accessed online.

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