The total for settled catastrophe bond issuance across Rule 144A deals and the private cat bond transactions we have analysed so far in 2026 has reached $16.1 billion as of today, while settled 144A cat bond issuance alone currently stands at over $15.8 billion.
Right now, based on latest sizes for the remaining cat bonds in the market pipeline for the first-half of this year, our up-to-date projection for H1 2026 total cat bond issuance is now around $16.96 billion, which would be the second biggest first-half ever for the cat bond market, slightly below the $17.56 billion we analysed and tracked in H1 2025.
There is still time for additional cat bonds to join the pipeline and settle before the end of June, but that time is now running short. For the first-half issuance record to be beaten we’d need to see meaningful upsizing of cat bonds already in the pipeline, a number of new deals, or one new larger cat bond appear.
FULL ORIGINAL PUBLICATION HERE