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Planet Money

How hurricanes became a hot investment

Planet Money

NPR

Business, News

4.629.8K Ratings

🗓️ 5 December 2025

⏱️ 31 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

A few years ago, the Jamaican government started making an unusual financial bet. It went to investors around the world asking if they'd like to wager on the chances a major hurricane would hit the island in the next couple of years. 

In finance terms, these kinds of wagers are called "catastrophe bonds." They're a way to get investors to share the risk of a major disaster, whether that's a Japanese earthquake, a California wildfire, or a Jamaican hurricane. 

This market for catastrophe has gotten really hot lately. And it’s changing the way that insurance works for all of us. 

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This episode was produced by Willa Rubin and edited by Marianne McCune. It was engineered by Jimmy Keeley and Kwesi Lee. Fact-checking by Sierra Juarez and Vito Emanuel. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer.

Music: Universal Music Production - “Lagos to London,” “Sleazy Does It,” “The Sundown Set.”

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Transcript

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1:31.7

This is Planet Money from NPR.

1:43.4

A few weeks ago, Favall Williams drove across Jamaica to the west side of the island to see the damage with her own eyes.

1:48.6

She was headed to where the worst hurricane in her country's history had made landfall.

1:52.3

When she got there, there was a lady, and she says,

1:54.0

come with me, let me show you.

1:56.5

This is where my house used to be.

1:59.0

And you go, where?

2:00.4

It's like like right here.

2:03.0

There was nothing in the space.

2:04.4

It was all gone.

2:14.9

You saw persons just sitting and looking off into the distance, wondering what's next.

...

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