A renaissance of globalisation and reduced geopolitical risk is one scenario, but Russia’s invasion of Ukraine reinforced momentum towards greater disorder and conflict, with unbridgeable disagreement over the rules of international engagement and battles over natural resources and technological supremacy. For speciality insurers, rising geopolitical risk translates into greater uncertainty over asset values and sector prospects. Assets can rapidly lose their ‘safe’ status and some sectors face sudden disruption. While geopolitical risk increases the demand for coverage, it also makes it hard to price that coverage. This requires the monitoring of a wider range of risk variables, in particular country and sector risk and the use of predictive models—if insurers do not, others will.
