Curated analysis and key findings from the leading global insurance research institutions — Swiss Re, Munich Re, Lloyd's, Aon, and the Geneva Association.
Swiss Re's flagship Sigma publication estimates global insurance premiums reached $7.5 trillion in 2025 — growing 5.8% in real terms, the fastest rate in a decade. Non-life premiums grew 8.2%, driven by rate hardening and exposure growth. Life premiums grew 3.6%, supported by record annuity demand in a high-rate environment.
Global insurance premium growth — non-life lines outpacing life premiums in 2025 amid sustained rate hardening.
The report identifies the insurance protection gap as the defining challenge: $1.8 trillion of uninsured economic losses annually — concentrated in natural catastrophe and health in emerging markets. Swiss Re estimates closing the gap would require $1.5 trillion in additional premium volume.
Climate change is projected to add $183B in annual insured losses by 2040 — equivalent to adding the entire current US homeowners insurance market's losses on top of the current global baseline.
Munich Re's 2025 NatCat Service report documents total global natural catastrophe losses of $820 billion — of which $420 billion (51%) were insured. The insured proportion has grown from 30% in 2000, reflecting improved penetration in developed markets, though the absolute gap between insured and total losses continues to widen.
Hurricane Helene (US, $95B insured) and the Noto Peninsula earthquake (Japan, $48B insured) were the costliest single events. The report highlights an increase in secondary perils (floods, wildfires, severe convective storms) relative to primary CAT events — challenging traditional CAT model frameworks.
"Secondary perils are no longer secondary in terms of loss impact. Severe convective storm alone accounted for $88B of insured losses globally in 2025 — a new record."
— Munich Re NatCat Service, Annual Report 2025Aon's annual climate and catastrophe report examines the intersection of climate science, economic exposure, and insurance market capacity. The 2025 edition focuses on the secondary peril problem: flood and severe convective storm events that fall below reinsurance attachment points are increasingly absorbed entirely by primary carriers — straining combined ratios without triggering reinsurance recovery.
Aon's analysis of the January 2026 reinsurance renewals shows attachment points rose an average of 25% over 2022 levels — effectively transferring more secondary peril exposure from reinsurers to primary carriers and their policyholders.
The Geneva Association's 2025 systemic risk report examines two existential threats to the insurance industry's social function: cyber systemic risk (correlated losses from a single large-scale cyber attack) and climate uninsurability (market withdrawal from high-risk zones).
The report recommends public-private partnership frameworks — similar to the US TRIA terrorism backstop — for cyber and climate tail risks that exceed private market capacity. Without governmental backstop mechanisms, the report concludes that major coastal and wildfire-exposed markets will face near-complete private market withdrawal within 10–15 years.
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