MarshBerry’s 2025 Peak Performance Summit (Peak) was held on February 10-12, 2025, at the Montage Deer Valley ski resort in Park City, UT. Peak is an invitation-only premier event for executives of specialty insurance firms, insurance carriers and those operating in and around the wholesale brokerage and delegated authority segment. This year Peak brought together over 150 like-minded industry leaders to network and discuss the state of the specialty insurance industry.
The two-day event featured MarshBerry leaders speaking on the state of the specialty insurance industry addressing topics such as the underwriting performance of surplus lines carriers (vs admitted markets), mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity, valuation, technology trends and the influence of market clout in a competitive and dynamic industry. It also featured two separate panel discussions from industry leaders on the challenges of the specialty market and strategies for driving exceptional growth.
Here are some highlights from this year’s Peak Performance Summit:
State of the Industry
MarshBerry’s Chairman and CEO John Wepler kicked off Peak by asking attendees, “Do you know how lucky you are?” He discussed the 15-year supercycle that the insurance industry is currently experiencing – an environment that has seen an exposure base explosion, the longest hard market run for both admitted lines and Excess & Surplus (E&S) lines, 15 years of positive organic growth, record valuations, and unprecedented capital market support.
Mr. Wepler stated, “Nearly every chart in our industry is going up and to the right – showing that every year is better than the prior year.”
However, Mr. Wepler did offer a word of caution to anyone thinking that the current supercycle might never end. He suggested that many brokers are actually “swimming naked” and at risk of being exposed when the hard market tide recedes. With the current political regime change we may be entering a new landscape of uncertainty and the supercycle could be under pressure.
The message is – those with a long-term plan and a growth mindset can weather any uncertainty.
State of Specialty
Gerard Vecchio, MarshBerry’s Managing Director, presented on the state of the specialty insurance market, the driving factors behind these challenging market conditions and their effects on pricing, capacity, and risk appetite. Mr. Vecchio talked about an industry in constant flux and one that resembles a “tale of two cities” where property lines are doing well, but casualty lines not so much – highlighting how liability claims over the past decade have increased by 57%.
Are there any indications that the specialty space will see equilibrium in 2025? Reiterating what Mr. Wepler said on the uncertainty of the economic landscape and potential inflationary conditions, Mr. Vecchio talked about carriers taking precautions on rates, risks, and exposure. Even with recent Fed Funds rate cuts, as overall inflation showed signs of stabilization in 2024, the inflation of claims related goods and services are not declining as much as other industries or inflationary components. Expect continued rate firming and reduced capacity (even shedding of unprofitable lines) for casualty in 2025.
Mr. Vecchio also moderated a panel of specialty leaders who shared their personal stories and lessons learned from overcoming challenges (e.g., lost market), providing insights into how their businesses triaged the situation and moved forward with even greater strength.
Leveraging Technology
Tobias Milchereit, Director at MarshBerry, spoke on the practical applications of technology in the specialty market. Currently, the insurance industry is not seeing the efficiency gains from technology that other industries are experiencing. Most technology systems in place today are inefficient, disconnected from each other and built on old architecture and therefore lacking the data integrity needed to effectively deploy advanced data analytics and AI solutions.
Deploying a full-stack digital system can not only lead to increased scalability, but also profitability, while making more informed and consistent underwriting decisions. As the world is changing rapidly, technology represents an opportunity for specialty brokers to gain relevance and advantages in the market. What appears to be a competitive advantage today will likely be table stakes in the not-too-distant future.
Mr. Milchereit pointed out that in this new world of technology it may no longer be about the “big fish eating the small fish” – rather it is more about the “fast fish eating the slow fish.” Specialty firms have the opportunity to be at the center of the next technology revolution in the insurance industry.
Market Clout in the Specialty Sector
George Bucur, MarshBerry’s Managing Director, presented on the impact that market clout is having on the continuing evolution of the specialty sector. With $210 billion in premium in 2024, the specialty market now represents approximately 20% of the total P&C marketplace.1 In 2025, MarshBerry estimates the U.S. specialty market premium volume will approximate $240 billion.2
As the big get bigger, specialty firms continue to play a pivotal role in the growth of the overall insurance distribution space. The number of top 20 insurance brokers (as ranked by Business Insurance based on 2023 revenue) with specialty platforms has increased from only one in 2005 to 15 in 2024. Even within the specialty space, the big are getting bigger. The ten largest specialty platforms have gone from $8.4 billion in total P&C premium (and 19% of the specialty marketplace) in 2009, to $133.2 billion in total P&C premium (and 63% of the specialty marketplace) in 2024.3
How are they doing it? By leveraging market clout. Firms are creating this clout and value by: Taking on growth capital to fuel strategic initiatives (like M&A transactions); reinvesting in people and underwriting talent to improve risk assessment, pricing and profitability; effectively utilizing technology to automate processes; and developing niches and diversifying their operations.
Mr. Bucur also led a panel discussion with industry leaders on their strategic growth initiatives. The discussion focused specifically on new and emerging products, coverage types and the now mainstream practice of identifying, attracting, incenting and developing broker and underwriting talent via various incubation models.
Specialty Market 2025 M&A Outlook
Peter Kampf, Vice President at MarshBerry, rounded out the Peak agenda with an in-depth analysis of the 2024 M&A results for the specialty market, and an outlook for 2025.
While the consolidation of the specialty marketplace continued in 2024, it was a down year for overall deal volume with 120 announced transactions, compared to the record year in 2023, with 181 announced deals. However, several interesting trends have emerged – pointing to a lack of supply of potential sellers for buyers of specialty firms, rather than a lack of interest.
Mr. Kampf pointed towards the rate of consolidation of specialty firms compared to their retail broker counterparts. Specialty firm acquisitions have consistently outperformed retail distribution acquisitions for several years. In 2024, relative to the total number of firms in each segment, 7.1% of specialty firms were acquired versus 2.6% of retail firms – nearly a 3x faster consolidation rate.
Another trend included the continued rise of acquisitions for life and health (L&H) distributors, which reached 52% of total transactions in 2024. There were also significant platform deals, highlighting the quality of sellers, with median all-in valuations (as a multiple of pro forma EBITDA) in the mid-teens, with the top 25% of deals completed by MarshBerry achieving over 20x all-in multiples.4 This speaks to the robust demand by the buyer and investor community.
Because of the strategic importance and value specialty firms bring to the insurance distribution space, there is an expected rebound for deal volume (and sustained or outperformance for values) in 2025.
MarshBerry’s Peak Performance Summit
If you attended this year’s Peak Performance Summit and wish to discuss any of the topics or strategies for unlocking growth or value, please email or call Gerard Vecchio, Managing Director, Specialty Practice Co-Head, at 212.972.4886, or George Bucur, Managing Director, Specialty Practice Co-Head, at 440.392.6543.
This is an invite-only event for industry leaders from the insurance industry that provides unique networking opportunities while learning about the most significant trends and challenges impacting the specialty distribution market. If you would like to learn more about this event, please visit this page.
If you have questions about Today’s ViewPoint or would like to learn more about how MarshBerry can help your firm determine its path forward, please email or call MarshBerry at 440.354.3230.
