A Fitch Ratings survey of 93 market participants at the Rendez-Vous de Septembre found that 42 percent now name life and health as their top priority for new capital, against fewer than 10 percent for property. With AM Best reporting rising life and health demand in Latin America and facultative price cuts of 5 to 20 percent, the softening that began in property is set to test discipline in personal lines.
Soft markets do not end where they begin. They migrate. Capital that can no longer earn its target return in property catastrophe does not return to shareholders; it looks for the next line where the margin still looks generous. This month’s evidence suggests that line is life and health, and that Latin American Group Life and Personal Accident will feel the arrival of that capital before it feels any change in mortality.
What the survey said
Fitch Ratings surveyed 93 reinsurers, brokers and other participants at the Rendez-Vous de Septembre. Sixty percent expect property catastrophe prices to fall again at the 1 January 2027 renewals, most by no more than 10 percent, following the sharp reductions of January 2026 when global reinsurance capital reached a record USD 760 billion, including USD 124 billion of third-party capital. Eighty-six percent expect terms and conditions to loosen, 58 percent selectively and 28 percent broadly, through lower attachments and wider event definitions. The more consequential finding concerns deployment: more than 90 percent named life and health, financial solutions or specialty as their highest priority for new capital, with life and health leading at 42 percent, against fewer than 10 percent for property. Fitch still expects the sector’s credit fundamentals to hold, noting that 88 percent of its rated reinsurance groups carry stable outlooks, but warns that capital allocation discipline will increasingly separate performers.
Latin America is already soft
AM Best’s September Market Segment Report describes a region where conditions have favoured cedants since the second half of 2024, through the June and July 2026 renewals, with facultative price reductions of 5 to 20 percent in some areas. It also records increasing life and health reinsurance demand driven by demographics, migration and evolving protection needs, and a growing interest in proportional structures. In Brazil, the share of domestic cessions placed with local reinsurers fell from about 70 percent in 2015 to 2018 to 53 percent at the end of 2025. The backdrop is not benign: ECLAC now projects regional growth of 2.2 percent for 2026, and this week Hurricane Polo put the World Bank’s USD 175 million parametric Pacific catastrophe bond for Mexico on watch, a reminder that accumulation risk in personal lines is catastrophe risk by another name.
What this means for Power Re
Power Re is a specialist in Group Life and Personal Accident across Latin America, which makes it a direct beneficiary of rising demand and a direct target of the capital now rotating toward the same lines. Our response is procedural rather than rhetorical. Ceding commissions and profit commissions are priced against credible experience and IBNR, not against the terms a new entrant is willing to offer. Event definitions and per-life and per-event limits on Personal Accident are treated as catastrophe wording, because a single industrial, transport or seismic event can accumulate across group schemes. Growth in proportional business is accepted only where data quality supports experience rating. When capacity is abundant, the scarce asset is judgement, and that is the asset we intend to supply.
Sources: Fitch Ratings survey via The Royal Gazette (25 September 2026); AM Best Market Segment Report via Reinsurance News (7 September 2026); Artemis and Insurance Journal on Hurricane Polo (September 2026).
Power Re perspective
This commentary reflects Power Re’s reading of public market reporting. It is general information, not underwriting, investment or legal advice.
