Airmic releases 2025 captive survey results
UK insurance trade group Airmic has released the results of its 2025 captive survey, carried out in conjunction with HDI. The release comes on the same day as the Airmic Captive Forum in Lloyd’s.
According to the survey it is conservatively estimated that Airmic members spend more than £5.1 billion in annual premium through their captives and hold more than £22.6 billion in assets under management in captives domiciled around the world, demonstrating that the captive is a valued, and trusted risk financing tool.
Existing captives continue to grow and write new lines of business, but as new captive insurance companies are formed and they move more into the mainstream, smaller captives make up a significant portion of those being utilised.
The growing popularity of captives is largely down to their flexibility and the range of business cases that make them viable. The size of captives and their annual premium can vary greatly, demonstrating that while they remain a highly valuable tool for large, multinational organisations, they also remain relevant to smaller organisations with more modest insurance spend.
More than a quarter of respondents write between £2 million and £5 million in annual premium through their captive(s) while 17% write more than £50 million.
“Nothing demonstrates the flexibility of captives more than the long list of different lines of business that Airmic members are writing through them,” Airmic wrote in summing up the survey results. “Historically captives were utilised for high frequency, low severity risks in an effort to underwrite more stable, predictable lines of business and avoid ‘dollar swapping’ with the commercial market. The market cycle of the past five years, however, has seen insureds include their captives in a greater range of programmes, with property now a particularly common risk insured by a captive.”
A range of liability lines continue to feature prominently in captive portfolios, while motor is now regularly written by captive insurers. Professional indemnity has long been a common line for captives in certain sectors to write, while 9% are underwriting some element of directors & officers cover. It is also notable that 44% of respondents are writing some kind of third-party risk through their captive, demonstrating that captives are not purely used for organisations’ own first-party risks.
There are more quality domicile options available to Airmic members than ever before and each captive will have a different risk profile, business or plan or ownership structure, which in turn will influence which domicile is appropriate. It is no surprise that Guernsey is the most common domicile choice among Airmic members, due to its long-standing position as a go-to jurisdiction for UK-headquartered companies and its proximity to the London insurance market, Airmic commented.
The Isle of Man holds a similar appeal for UK businesses, while the results demonstrate the international nature of Airmic members and their insurance programmes. Taking Ireland, Malta and Luxembourg together, a quarter of Airmic respondents own a captive inside the European Union, while Vermont is the most common US domicile among respondents.
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