Chubb remains top US cyber insurer despite premium drop in 2024

(The Insurer) - New figures from AM Best show that Chubb has clung on to the top spot in the U.S. cyber insurer rankings despite its premiums falling last year and second-placed Travelers growing its business by almost 40%.

The rating agency’s report said that the top insurers by premium and policy count have remained unchanged for several years.

Chubb remains the top insurer by premium despite a small decrease from 2023 of 2.3%. This decrease exactly matched the industry total decrease in 2024.

The Evan Greenberg-led insurer’s $560.3 million of cyber direct premiums written in 2024 gave it a 7.9% market share.

Three of the top five insurers by DPW recorded double-digit percentage changes in premiums.

Travelers surged into second place following a 39.1% increase in DPW to $535.4 million in 2024, giving it a 7.6% market share. The year began with the completion of Travelers’ acquisition of insurtech Corvus.

In contrast, third-placed Fairfax Financial (USA) Group’s DPW fell 22.1% to $360.6 million and fifth-placed XL Americas Companies’ DPW fell 30.1% to $340.4 million in 2024.

Eighteen of the top 20 insurers by 2024 premium were also in the top 20 the previous year.

Cyber specialist At-Bay Specialty catapulted into the top 10, increasing its market share to 4.0% with $280 million in DPW. It placed seventh in the rankings by 2024 DPW compared with 32nd in 2023.

“At-Bay Specialty achieved substantial growth through using its affiliated digital broker platform to effectively streamline the solicitation and quotation process,” the report said.

QBE North America also entered the top 20 in 2024, with its cyber premiums more than doubling from the previous year after launching a comprehensive and globally consistent cyber product.

“The group is gradually expanding its global cyber offering,” the report said of QBE.

AM Best highlighted that the overall U.S. cyber insurance industry appears to be profitable, but “at an individual company level there appear to be pockets of concern highlighting the volatile nature of cyber risk”.

“Also of note, these results do not reflect losses recouped from reinsurers, and the net underwriting results could be different,” the report said.

The insurers in the top 20 with the highest loss and defence and cost containment ratios in 2024 included Starr International Group (96.3%), QBE North America Insurance Group (89.3%), Berkshire Hathaway Insurance Group (85.7%), Zurich Insurance US PC Group (78.3%) and CNA Insurance Companies (74.8%).

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ cyber supplement for 2024 was newly separated by primary, excess and endorsement coverage, an overhaul from the previous two-way standalone/packaged split.

“Excess policies, offering larger limits and typically covering larger entities with more exposure, are more expensive than either primary policies or endorsements to other policies,” the report said. “There is a current movement toward excess policies, with larger companies increasing their retention within the primary layer or using a captive for their primary insurance.”

By policy count, The Hartford Insurance Group is dominant, with more than double the number of policies of any other cyber insurance writer.

“The top four writers by policy count all write mostly by endorsement, which is a high-volume, low-premium policy setup. Cyber coverage by endorsement of another commercial policy is common for SMEs,” the report said.