Approximately 72 percent of the cat bonds placed so far in 2013 deal with U.S. hurricane risk—almost identical to last year—but there was a number of diversifying bonds placed in Q2. Among these, Willis noted Munich Re's Queen Street VIII for exposure to Australian cyclone risk and Turkish Cat Pool's Bosphorus I Re covering Turkish quake risks.

Willis says it is too soon to tell whether the success of these issuances will draw more interest to non-U.S. wind peril bonds.

The head of ILS at WCMA, Bill Dubinsky, says the report raises questions about how far the cat bond and collateralized reinsurance market can expand beyond its mainstay of natural catastrophe perils. To continue on the same pace of growth seen in the past few years the market will need to accept a growing pool of perils, he says.

“Some of these new perils are evolutionary, not revolutionary—such as earthquake risk in areas like Colombia, Chile, Israel and even China,” says Dubinsky. “Others may represent a more radical departure from market norms. For example, will investors accept standalone U.S. terrorism risk if [the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program) is not renewed? Will casualty risk finally become more at home in the capital markets?”

Touching on sidecar issuances, the market is growing once again after reaching heights of around $3.3 billion in 2006 before its fall during the economic crisis. So far in 2013, there have been seven sidecars announced with an estimated capacity of over $1 billion.