Mereo Advisors, the Bermuda based insurance, reinsurance and asset management group that also manages insurance-linked securities (ILS) funds, has been rebranded as Cedar Trace.Cedar Trace Advisers Limited, the newly named entity, continues to have a close strategic alignment with Mereo Insurance, the Bermuda regulated reinsurance company..The reinsurance company finalised a $700m+ capital raise for its equity balance-sheet we understand, gaining an ‘A-‘ rating from AM Best, while the group also deployed around $250m in capacity from its insurance-linked securities (ILS) fund at the January reinsurance renewals.

Now, the Mereo Advisors arm has been rebranded and along with it all of the Mereo ILS entities and funds.The management of the business remains the same under the Cedar Trace branding, while the relationship with Mereo Insurance will not change.“The name and logo changes are to draw a clearer distinction between the regulated balance sheet and all the other business lines we currently operate or plan to operate,” said Lawrence Minicone, Cedar Trace’s CEO.

But, in terms of branding and the names of insurance-linked securities (ILS) management and funds going forwards: Mereo Advisors Holdings Limited, becomes Cedar Trace Advisers Holdings Limited; Mereo Advisors Limited, becomes Cedar Trace Advisers Limited; Mereo Capital Limited, becomes Cedar Trace Capital Management Limited; and Mereo ILS Opportunities Limited, becomes Cedar Trace ILS Opportunities Limited.The Mereo ILS Opportunities Fund was the first ILS fund strategy from Mereo ILS.It is a diversified open-ended fund and is primarily allocated to opportunities in illiquid property insurance, reinsurance, retrocession, catastrophe bonds and industry loss warranties (ILWs) and an initial $250 million of limit was deployed by the fund at the start of this year.

We also understood at the time that the company planned to launch a Mereo Diversified ILS investment strategy, which would enable investors to allocate capital to a diversified quota share of the balance-sheet insurance company as well.It appears these funds will become the Cedar Trace Opportunities and Diversified ILS funds, under the new branding...

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