This keynote speech took place at the Artemis ILS Asia 2023 conference in Singapore on July 13th.

This session featured Yusuke Kikuchi, Managing Director at Aon Securities (Japan), the catastrophe bond, insurance-linked securities (ILS) and capital markets division of the global insurance and reinsurance broker.

Kikuchi discussed the rapid economic growth potential of the Asia Pacific region, going on to highlight the magnitude of catastrophe losses that occur there and the resultant and still growing insurance protection gap.

He went on to run through a timeline of catastrophe bond issuance in the region, highlighting key transactions and sponsors, as well as the handful of reinsurance sidecar deals that have been completed in APAC.

Importantly, he noted the convergence of pricing between traditional reinsurance and ILS rates, which is helping to make the cat bond and ILS product range more appealing to sponsors.

Going on to explain that there is still outsized demand from ILS investors for access to APAC risks, which means any Asia Pacific focused cat bonds and ILS would likely be well-received, while also saying that demand for ILS investments from allocators in Asia Pacific also remains high and further flows to the asset class from the region should be expected.

Listen to the full podcast episode to learn more about catastrophe bond and ILS market activity in Asia Pacific and the opportunity to grow the cat bond market in the region.