Bermuda registered 20 new insurers in the first quarter of 2026, with capital markets structures and life reinsurance vehicles accounting for most formations, the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) confirmed.
The BMA reported six new registrations in March, following nine in January and five in February. During February's review cycle, one application was deferred.
Restricted special purpose insurers, streamlined vehicles typically used for insurance-linked securities and catastrophe bond transactions, made up seven of the 20 registrations. Class E insurers, which focus on long-term and life reinsurance business, accounted for six more. Together, the two segments represented nearly two-thirds of all formations in the quarter.
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The concentration continues a pattern from 2025, when capital-markets-driven structures dominated new registrations. The trend reflects sustained investor appetite for uncorrelated returns.
Swiss Re's Cat Bond Total Return Index delivered 11.4% in 2025, and the firm's head of ILS, Jean-Louis Monnier, has pointed to significant capital inflows and low market losses as key drivers behind a year of record issuance.
Bermuda's dominance over the global ILS market underscores the momentum. The Bermuda Stock Exchange captured over 93% of global ILS issuance last year, with catastrophe bond issuance reaching $25.6 billion, a 45% increase over the prior-year record of $17.7 billion.
The six Class E formations reflect a broader structural shift in how US life insurers manage their balance sheets. Research from Mayer Brown, citing Oliver Wyman data published in March, estimated that nearly $1 trillion in US life insurance reserves have now been ceded to offshore jurisdictions.
Read more: BILTIR signals continued scrutiny of Bermuda life reinsurance asset strategies
Record annuity sales in the US have fed the pipeline, with LIMRA reporting $347 billion in total sales through the first nine months of 2025.
Traditional commercial insurers represented a smaller share of first-quarter entrants. Only one Class 3 insurer and two Class 3A insurers were registered, alongside a single Class 4 and one Class A entity.
The BMA's Insurance Assessment and Licensing Committee reviewed nine applications in March, approving all of them. The pace follows updated licensing guidance the regulator issued in February, which formalized pre-application consultations as the jurisdiction contends with growing competition from Asia-Pacific hubs including Hong Kong and Singapore.
Bermuda remains one of only two jurisdictions recognized as regulatorily equivalent with both the EU and the US.
The first-quarter total of 20 follows a full-year count of 58 in 2025, down from 63 in 2024 and well below the 80 recorded in 2022. At its current pace, 2026 would match that near-decade high, suggesting the BMA's pipeline of applicants shows no sign of thinning.
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