2020: Global life & health insurance becomes biggest industry with $4.4trn revenue

According to the research data analyzed and published by ComprarAcciones.com, life and health insurance will be the biggest industry globally in 2020.

The sector has been growing at an average rate of 2.4 per cent from 2015 to 2020 and will surpass $4.384 trillion.

According to Global Data, the insurance sector as a whole raked in $2.611 trillion in 2019 and was the sixth largest. Notably though, an Allianz Global insurance report projects a decline of 3.8 per cent for the industry worldwide in 2020.

2019 was a great year for insurance as premiums grew at a rate of 4.4 per cent. However, the 2020 decline will be over three times worse than after the 2008 financial crisis. At the time, the sector only shrank 1 per cent.

An Allianz study projects that in 2021, the growth rate of insurance premiums will return to pre-pandemic levels.

Oil and gas, which was the top industry in 2019, is ranked third in 2020. It is expected to rake in $3.325 trillion in revenue in 2020. In 2019, it made over $4.797 trillion, growing 16.2 per cent in revenue and 36.3 per cent in profits year-on-year (YoY).

The situation in 2020 is vastly different as the top 12 publicly traded oil companies reported a collective loss of $80 billion.

According to Anadolu Agency, during H1 2019, they had posted a collective net income of $46.5 million.

On the other hand, banking was the third largest industry by revenue in 2019, raking in $4.424 trillion. However, in 2020, it sits in the eight spot and is estimated to generate $2.341 trillion.

Putting this in perspective, the top five Chinese banks reported a drop of $9.9 billion in H1 2020 profit. In the US, the top sixbanks increased loan loss provisions from $25 billion in Q1 2020 to $35 billion in Q2 2020.