The 2026 Baden-Baden Reinsurance Meeting took place against a backdrop of record reinsurance capital, improving primary insurers’ profitability, and increasingly complex risks. While abundant capacity is expected to support more competitive conditions at the January 1 renewals, reinsurers remain determined to maintain underwriting discipline, particularly regarding catastrophe retentions, casualty exposures, and emerging risks.

Cyber risk is becoming an increasingly important board-level concern, with 70% of organizations now formally integrating it into their enterprise risk management frameworks, according to Willis' latest Directors' & Officers' Liability Insurance Survey 2026: Cyber in Focus. However, despite growing awareness of cyber threats, fewer than half of respondents currently have cyber insurance coverage.

With insured natural catastrophe losses in Europe rising by an average of 5% annually since 1980 and risks becoming increasingly complex, Munich Re warns against complacency following periods of lower losses. The reinsurer stresses that traditional reinsurance remains essential to providing reliable capacity and financial protection as insurers face mounting challenges from climate change, claims inflation, cyber threats and interconnected risks.

Eastern Europe was among the world's fastest-growing regions in terms of household financial wealth in 2025, according to the latest Allianz Global Wealth Report 2026. Gross financial assets increased by 11.2%, significantly outperforming the global average of 8.6% and Western Europe's 4.5%. However, substantial differences in accumulated wealth remain between Central and Eastern European countries, while inflation continues to erode part of the gains in purchasing power.

Strategic decisions are becoming harder to execute because the conditions required to deliver them are changing at the same time, according to “The decision advantage”, the latest research by Willis, a WTW business.

Risks are becoming increasingly interconnected, creating new pathways through which relatively contained shocks can ripple faster and further through the economy, according to new joint analysis by Swiss Re Institute and LSE. It finds 24% more links between risks reported by 91 Fortune-100 companies than in 2019, with AI and supply chains emerging as key points of connection.

Climate risk is becoming more complex, more systemic, and more immediate. Effective adaptation now goes beyond protecting physical assets, operations, and people — it also depends on the suppliers, infrastructure, and wider systems organizations rely on, Marsh’s Climate adaptation 2026 survey says.

Geopolitical risks, the continuing legal legacy of the Covid-19 pandemic and evolving interpretations of insurance contracts are among the key themes of the latest Reinsurance Round-Up, the September 2026 review prepared by Carter Perry Bailey LLP.

A strengthening El Niño could significantly alter the global catastrophe risk landscape in the coming months, although its effects will vary considerably across regions and perils, according to a new SCOR Expert Views report, El Niño 2026: Implications for Global Catastrophe Risk and Insured Losses.

How much capital is enough for an insurer — and how can companies maintain a comfortable solvency position without unnecessarily constraining growth? SCOR’s latest “Solvency & Reinsurance in Europe” study provides some particularly interesting answers, based on year-end 2025 Solvency II disclosures.

Insurers' return on equity reached 16.8% in 2025, its highest level since 2009. But premium has growth slowed and insurers face a new challenge: sustaining growth and delivering consistent performance through the cycle, according to Aon’s new analysis.

The first half of 2026 saw estimated insured natural catastrophe losses of USD 42 billion, 16% below the 10-year average. Insured losses from severe convective storms were also below trend, with the biggest outbreaks largely sparing the most exposed regions in the US, a recent study of Swiss Re Institute says.

Global insured losses from natural catastrophes reached an estimated USD 42 billion in the first half of 2026, well below the long-term trend, a recent Swiss Re Institute report reads.

Global commercial insurance rates fell, on average, by 6% in the second quarter of 2026, following a 5% decline in Q1 2026. Property rates declined by 12% while casualty rates increased 2%, driven largely by continued challenges in the US, according to the latest Global Insurance Market Index (GIMI) released today by Marsh.

In the first six months of the year, natural disasters caused worldwide losses estimated at nearly USD 112 billion. Of those losses, only USD 44 billion were insured, representing an insurance gap of 60%, according to the Munich Re’s natural disaster review for the first half of 2026.

Global economic losses totaled USD 111 billion during 1H2026, 25% below the 21st-century average and the lowest first half total since 2018. However, the period still produced USD 23 billion economic loss events – matching the long-term average – and USD 13 billion insured loss events, exceeding the historical average of USD 10 billion insured loss events.

Switzerland has built strong resilience to floods, storms and other natural hazards. According to Swiss Re Institute analysis, extreme heat is putting that resilience to the test, as the country warms more than twice as fast as the global average according to Swiss Academy of Sciences, Swiss Re said in its press release.

Recent discussions held in Croatia and Poland point to a growing consensus across the insurance industry: climate change is fundamentally reshaping the property insurance landscape, forcing insurers to rethink both risk assessment and customer engagement strategies.

SLA exposure is among the most significant operational risks facing data centers today, according to Parametrix, the Lloyd’s of London coverholder redefining the insurance and finance of digital infrastructure.

The world is experiencing one of the most volatile geopolitical periods in our history since the end of World War Two. Even before the current conflict in the Middle East, the risks posed by political violence and civil unrest had been intensifying, evolving into global challenges that impact companies, communities, and the wider economy.