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Canadian and United States brokerage revenues in 2012 accounted for 50.8% of the global market for commercial non-life insurance broking, estimated to be a total of $46.26 billion.
That’s up from $41.9 billion in 2008, according to new research by Finaccord. The study estimates that the value of the global market for commercial non-life insurance broking revenues will further increase to $55.43 billion in the years to 2016.
The enormous value of premiums in the underlying market for commercial non-life insurance in North America partly explains the dominance of Canadian and American brokers in the global market.
Another reason is the dominance of brokers in the distribution of commercial insurance in North America. In Canada, the broker share of distribution of commercial non-life insurance policies is estimated to be the highest in the world, at 93%, Finaccord says. U.S. brokers, by contrast, have a commercial lines share of 73%.
Across 30 countries studied,
Aon and
Marsh are by far the largest players in global commercial non-life insurance broking.
Aon is estimated to account for about 13% of global revenues, ahead of Marsh (11%) and Willis (3%). Finaccord’s analysis found that Aon has only a marginally higher market share in North America than Marsh. However, Aon is estimated to have bigger lead over Marsh in Europe and in the rest of the world.
Commercial non-life insurance broking markets outside of Europe and North America are growing rapidly and will account for 23.6% of the global market by 2016, Finaccord estimates.
Emerging markets experienced high growth rates, led by India with a nominal compound annual growth rate of 36.3% between 2008 and 2012, followed by Argentina and China with annual increases of 28.0% and 22.4%, respectively.
“Outside Europe and North America, the significance of brokers as intermediaries of commercial non-life insurance can vary dramatically as they play only a very small role in some countries, such as Japan where multi-tied agents are far more important, whereas brokers dominate the distribution of commercial lines in Argentina, Australia, Brazil and South Africa among other countries,” said Bernd Bergmann, a consultant at Finaccord. “Crucially, they also account for a rapidly rising proportion of the market in China and India.”
