Around 60% of carriers to buy more facultative reinsurance, Willis says

By Ashish Tiwari Sept 18 (The Insurer) — Facultative reinsurance is becoming a key tool for insurers seeking growth in a softening market, helping them increase line sizes, deploy excess capital and expand into new territories while managing volatile risks, Willis said in a report on Thursday. The Willis Facultative Global Survey, conducted with Coleman Parkes Research, surveyed 380 senior decision-makers at P&C insurers with over $1 billion in gross written premium across North America, EMEA, Asia Pacific and Latin America. “The softening market of 2025 has turned into a dash for growth in 2026,” the broker said, as insurers pursue opportunities beyond home markets that are already “saturated with capacity”. More than half of respondents (56%) identified global expansion as one of their biggest opportunities for the next two years, up from 39% in Willis' 2024 survey. Some 52% cited entering new markets and risk areas among their leading strategic objectives, while 55% identified increasing capacity. Willis noted that regional and local insurers were increasingly writing business outside their “normal catchment” to generate growth. Insurers from the Middle East and Asia, for exampl