Catastrophe bond issuances that have been fully settled in the market now amount to more than $10.4 billion, while the pipeline for new cat bond deals remains robust and Artemis Deal Directory data already forecasts around $14.35 billion of settled issuance by early June.
In fact, fully-settled issuance of new cat bonds hit the $10 billion mark on May 13th in 2025, according to our data, while in 2026 that level of issuance had been achieved on May 14th, so just a single day behind last year’s pace.
Now, with an additional deal settling today, cat bond issuance in 2026 is officially at just over $10.4 billion.
With a further almost $4 billion in the pipeline currently, if all of those catastrophe bonds come in at their upper-target sizes the total will reach $14.35 billion by early June.
There is a way to go before getting excited about potential new half-year issuance records, but whether those are broken or not 2026 continues the cat bond markets trend of robust activity levels.
At the same time execution is incredibly strong for sponsors right now, which could attract additional deals to market, potentially helping to maintain the recent pace of issuance.
You can see where catastrophe bond issuance and the forward pipeline of deals stands today in this interactive chart.
The first-quarter of 2026 was the second busiest on record, only slightly trailing last year.
This second-quarter has seen robust activity levels so far and we understand there are potentially more deals ready to join the pipeline, so H1 2026 may at least come close to last year’s record almost $17.6 billion of settled cat bonds.
May is looking particularly strong so far, with our latest projection suggesting the month could finish with almost $5.3 billion of cat bonds settling in it. Behind last year’s $5.93 billion, but there is time for that to change and catch up further.
Analyse cat bond issuance by month and year in this interactive chart.
In particular, we continue to hear that State Farm is in the market with another of its more privately offered catastrophe bonds and knowing the size its issuances can grow to, that could make all the difference in 2026.
Analyse the catastrophe bond market using our charts and visualisations, which are kept up-to-date as every new transaction settles.
Download our free quarterly catastrophe bond market reports.
We track catastrophe bond and related ILS issuance data, the most prolific sponsors in the market, most active structuring and bookrunning banks and brokers, which risk modellers feature in cat bonds most frequently, plus much more.
Find all of our charts and data here, or via the Artemis Dashboard which provides a handy one-page view of cat bond market metrics.
All of these charts and visualisations are updated as soon as a new cat bond issuance is completed, or as older issuances mature.
All of our catastrophe bond market charts and visualisations are up-to-date and include data on new cat bond transactions as they settle.
