Howden Re launches Cyber Report: Into the Cyberverse
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Cyber reinsurance matures as industry looks to sustainable growth and innovation
Howden Re has released its latest cyber reinsurance report, Into the Cyberverse, offering a timely and detailed look at today’s fast-evolving cyber risk landscape and calling for industry advancement, innovation and investment.
Cyber is maturing into a distinct asset class with diversified reinsurance product offerings. This report reflects the growing confidence of cyber reinsurance buyers and sellers in managing systemic cyber risk. Cedents must nevertheless continue to evaluate reinsurance purchasing strategies critically and holistically, ensuring alignment with risk tolerances and broader portfolio objectives, to maximise risk transfer efficiency.
Visualising the 2025 cyber market ecosystem
Cyber reinsurance is growing, with a broader range of products and increasing comfort around the risk profile. However, market share remains concentrated: the top five reinsurers account for 62% of cyber GWP, and the top ten 87%, according to Howden Re estimates. This highlights the need for greater diversification.
Quota share cessions have dropped from 57% to 45% over the past five years, making non-proportional cover more attractive for tail-risk. As this trend continues, demand for retrocession capacity will increase to manage the added volatility.
Who owns the tail?
Catastrophic cyber loss remains hard to pin down. The report explores where losses fall along the chain, using both probabilistic and fixed attrition models. It finds that insurers and reinsurers broadly share tail risk up to the 1-in-200 year event level, though fixed attrition analysis suggests insurers may not always get the expected benefit from some structures. Both perspectives are needed to fully understand where risk sits.
Back to the future
Looking ahead, Into the Cyberverse envisions a cyber market where global premiums could double to US$30 billion. The share of quota share premium is projected to fall to 25% (from 32% today), while non-proportional reinsurance could grow to 6.5% (up from 4%). This expansion will depend on deeper retrocession markets and improved understanding of accumulation risk—especially as a 1-in-200 event could result in an industry loss ratio of 326%, compared to 272% today.
Into the Cyberverse makes plain that tomorrow’s cyber market will be powered as much by insight as by capital. Robust models, richer data and advanced analytics are the engines that will unlock fresh capacity, attract new participants and contain accumulation risk. By stress-testing programmes through both probabilistic and fixed-attrition lenses, our analysis pinpoints where volatility truly resides and shows how innovative structures can keep growth on a sustainable footing.
The cyber (re)insurance market’s trajectory is unparalleled in both pace and complexity, requiring strategic adjustments to purchasing strategies, holistic approaches to loss transfer and diversification of market participants to realise its full potential.