Heightened competition expected at renewal as capital outstrips demand: SCOR CEO

Thierry Léger, CEO of global reinsurer SCOR, said this morning that it’s too early to tell whether property catastrophe reinsurance remains attractively priced at the end of year renewals, but his company is anticipating heightened competition in the market as capital build-up outstrips still-rising demand.

Reporting its third-quarter 2025 results this morning, SCOR revealed net income of €217 million, reversing the loss for the same period last year, as the property and casualty (P&C) combined ratio strengthened by 7.5 percentage points to 80.9%.

Speaking during a media call, SCOR’s CEO Thierry Léger said he expects the January 2026 reinsurance renewals will be particularly competitive.

Léger explained, “What we see is a strong year 2025, with high profits for the reinsurance industry. Accordingly, companies are building capital. That capital provides the capacity to write business. So either they give the capital back to their shareholders, or they try to write more business.

“So we see a market generally at heightened competition. We also see that capital build has been stronger than the demand.

“The good thing is, demand is up. Demand for reinsurance is generally up these years, which creates a very nice environment, just generally a good environment. But the available capacities, capital is going stronger now than the demand, which again points to increased competition. So at SCOR, we prepare for a stronger, more competitive renewal.”

Discussing where SCOR expects opportunity to continue growing into diversifying lines of reinsurance, Léger highlighted engineering, credit and surety, structured solutions and longevity risks.

Saying, “So these are lines that we still believe will be attractive as we head into 2026 that’s important.”

Turning to the property catastrophe reinsurance renewals, Léger was more cautious as to how attractive the business will be at the 1/1 2026 renewals.

“Then there is the cat environment, where current rates are still relatively attractive. So we will have to see in reality where the price levels will be, the structures and the conditions.

“Right now, it’s very difficult to make a prediction in cat whether there will be real profitable opportunities for us to go further,” SCOR’s CEO explained.

Léger went on to state, “But I do believe with our differentiating strategy, with our tier one franchise and tier two market share, we should be able to continue what we have done the last two years, which means grow in in a more determined, more strategic way, into profitable, diversifying lines of business.

“So the strategy is the same. It has really worked well this year, and there’s no reason to believe that this shouldn’t be possible next year. So we remain optimistic in SCOR’s positioning in the current more competitive market.”

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