Beazley gets new PoleStar Re 2024-3 cyber cat bond with further upsize to $210m

Beazley has now secured its latest cyber catastrophe bond and further upsized the transaction to provide even more in reinsurance, with the PoleStar Re Ltd. (Series 2024-3) issuance set to price at $210 million in size for the company, Artemis has learned.

Beazley returned to the catastrophe bond market at the beginning of the month with what will be its third 144A cyber catastrophe bond sponsorship.

At launch to investors this PoleStar Re 2024-3 issuance was initially marketed at just $75 million in size, but as we reported yesterday the company lifted the target to a much larger $200 million.

Now, Artemis has learned from sources that the issuance has been increased in size again and is now set to provide Beazley with $210 million of additional cyber reinsurance protection.

It speaks to both the investor appetite for cyber cat bonds growing and the willingness to support leading companies cyber reinsurance needs in the capital markets.

Having first brought private cyber cat bonds to market, Beazley then sponsored its first 144A cyber cat bond in December 2023, securing the $140 million PoleStar Re 2024-1 deal. This was followed up with a $160 million PoleStar Re Ltd. (Series 2024-2) issuance in May 2024.

Those first two PoleStar Re cyber cat bonds filled out a layer of Beazley’s cyber reinsurance tower from an attachment point of $500 million up to exhaustion at $800 million.

This new PoleStar Re 2024-3 cyber cat bond extends Beazley’s capital markets backed cyber reinsurance protection, with the latest issuance having an attachment point at $800 million and covering a share of losses to exhaustion at $1.2 billion.

So, with this latest cyber cat bond now finalised for size at $210 million, we understand Beazley has filled out more than half of that layer sitting on top of the first two PoleStar Re 144A deals.

To recap, this new $210 million PoleStar Re 2024-3 cyber cat bond will provide Beazley with a source of broad cyber reinsurance coverage from the capital markets, protecting it against major cyber loss events that impact its underwriting entities, including the syndicates at Lloyd’s and its US insurers, with the coverage again on an indemnity trigger and per-occurrence basis.

The notes come with an initial attachment probability of 1.2%, an initial exhaustion probability of 0.7% and an initial expected loss of 0.93%.

At their launch earlier this month, the PoleStar Re 2024-3 cyber cat bond notes came with price guidance in a range from 9.5% to 10.5%.

We were then told the guidance had been updated at the top-end, of 10.5% and we’re now told this is where the issuance has been finalised.

At this level, the latest PoleStar Re cyber cat bond will have a slightly higher multiple-at-market than the 2024-2 and 2024-3 notes paid to investors.

So with this deal now finalised and set to be priced later today, we understand, Beazley will have $510 million of cyber reinsurance protection in force from the catastrophe bond market through the PoleStar Re series of deals.

You can read all about this PoleStar Re Ltd. (Series 2024-3)  catastrophe bond transaction to our Deal Directory, where you can analyse details of almost every cat bond ever issued and filter the list by peril to show only cyber cat bonds.