Plenum Investments

Investment decisions are led by Managing Partner Rainer Schuler, who has been with the firm since its founding in 1998. Day-to-day ILS portfolio management is overseen by Daniel Zaugg, Head of Insurance-Linked Strategies, and Senior Portfolio Manager Dirk Schmelzer. The team operates a centralized research process that combines proprietary natural-catastrophe modeling with external vendor output.

Yes, Plenum manages a UCITS-compliant ILS fund that provides daily liquidity — a rarity in the insurance-linked securities market where most funds impose quarterly or annual redemption windows. This structure opens the strategy to institutional allocators who require UCITS wrappers, such as European pension funds and insurance companies. The daily-liquidity feature requires the portfolio to hold a significant allocation to liquid catastrophe bonds alongside private ILS positions.

Plenum sources private insurance-linked transactions through direct relationships with global reinsurers, brokers, and specialty insurers. These deals are typically collateralized reinsurance contracts that do not trade in secondary markets, giving the firm access to a premium spread over publicly traded catastrophe bonds. The sourcing network draws on relationships built over two decades of operating in the ILS market.

Plenum's ILS portfolios cover peak natural catastrophe perils including United States named windstorms, European windstorms, Japanese and Californian earthquakes, and select secondary perils such as wildfire and severe convective storm. The firm adjusts per-risk exposure based on modeled loss expectations, with US hurricane historically representing the largest single-peril allocation — consistent with the broader ILS market structure.

Plenum's ILS funds absorbed losses during the 2017–2018 period — which included hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria, as well as California wildfires — but did not suspend redemptions or permanently impair their share classes. The firm's ability to maintain operational continuity through that loss cycle and subsequent recovery years is a key differentiator cited by European institutional investors who screen ILS managers for survivorship risk.

Plenum Investments is an independent, partner-owned asset manager based in Zurich and regulated by the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA. It is not a subsidiary of a bank, insurer, or larger asset management group. The partnership structure means the firm's investment principals hold direct equity in the management company, aligning their incentives with fund investors.

Plenum has historically adopted an event-driven deployment posture following major catastrophe events, when reinsurance pricing spikes. The firm has publicly reported allocating capital to instruments linked to Hurricane Ian recovery and Japanese typhoon exposures, reflecting a willingness to lean into hard-market conditions when modeled expected returns exceed long-term averages.