What are the 10 largest insurance companies in Australia

The 10 largest insurance companies in Australia

Accounting for 99.8% of the nation’s total of $71.05 billion, the 10 largest insurance companies in Australia have a combined market capitalisation of $70.9 billion. The overall feature can be attributed to the 13 insurers and brokerages trading in the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). These include an insurance company which exclusively operates in New Zealand.

Market capitalisation, known as market cap, is a metric which is often used by investors to decide whether a company is a risky or safe investment. It still provides a good opportunity for investors looking to diversify their portfolios although the country’s insurance sector presents relatively fewer options compared to other regions.

If you’re an investor searching for insurance companies in order to add to your portfolio, this piece can help minimize your choices. This article can serve as a useful source of information for who you may want to seek work If you’re an insurance professional. Here, the 10 biggest insurers ranked by Insurance Business ranks listed in the ASX based on market cap. You are requested to read on and learn more about the largest insurance companies in Australia.

1. QBE Insurance Group Limited

It has Market cap: $21.06 billion

It's Business type: Insurance company

It has Business line: General insurance, reinsurance

Location of Headquarters: Sydney, NSW

QBE is a global insurer and reinsurer that proudly operates in 37 countries. It is proud of a 14,500-strong workforce worldwide and offers a range of personal, commercial, and specialty insurance products and risk management solutions. QBE operates in the five regional divisions.

In Australia, QBE is the third-largest general insurer, take over for more than a tenth of the market. The three business lines where the company focuses on are:

Car and vehicle insurance: Car and vehicle insurance insurance Includes boat, caravan, motorcycle, and compulsory third-party (CTP) insurance.

Home insurance: Home insurance includes contents, landlord, and building warranty insurance.

Small business insurance: Small business insurance includes accident and health, commercial motor, farm, general liability, professional liability, and workers’ compensation insurance.

Moreover, QBE Australia has specialist teams to assist clients in order to search for coverage that matches their unique needs. 

These include: 

Surety and credit: Surety and credit protects businesses from bad debt and provides financial security through surety bonds

Elders insurance: This insurance is one of the country’s largest regional insurance businesses being a joint venture between QBE and Elders Rural Services Australia

Lenders’ mortgage insurance: Lenders’ mortgage insurance is also called LMI, that helps aspiring homeowners who haven’t saved enough for a deposit to purchase a house sooner. QBE has policyholders in almost 140 countries.

2. Suncorp Group Limited

It's market cap: $15.03 billion

It's business type: Insurance company

It's business line: General insurance

It's headquarters: Brisbane, QLD

In Australia Suncorp is among the most recognised financial brands. The company offers a range of financial services and products, apart from personal and commercial insurance it being one of the country’s mid-sized banks. Suncorp is the second-largest in the country, trailing only industry giant IAG because it manages more than a quarter of Australia’s general insurance market that. Through its several brands It offers insurance policies including:

AAMI: AAMI offers home, contents, landlord, and strata insurance along with car and vehicle coverage. Moreover business, health, life, and income protection insurance policies are also available.

Apia: Apia is a specialist insurer for over 50s, the brand sells car, property, health, travel, funeral and injury support coverage.

Bingle: Bingle provides no-frills car insurance at affordable rates. In case you want to get additional tips on how to save on auto insurance, you can check out our guide to cheaper car insurance. 

CIL Insurance: CIL Insurance covers everything from tiny houses and horse floats to slide-ons and trailers and offers an array of caravan and RV insurance policies.

Essentials by AAI: Essentials by AAI provides different types of coverages to Australians who might not have the money for mainstream insurance.

GIO: GIO is designed for those customers who live outside Queensland. The brand offers insurance policies on car, home, life, business, and travel.

Shannons: Shannons cares for motoring enthusiasts, the brand specialises in car and bike insurance, moreover offers home and CTP insurance. Shannons also holds regular auctions for collectible motorcycles, cars, and racing memorabilia.

Terri Scheer: Terri Scheer, a landlord insurance specialist, provides cover for tenant-related risks and unexpected events that cause property damage.

Vero: Vero provides coverage to SMEs and larger businesses, including tax audit, workers’ compensation, professional and financial risks, surety bonds, non-profit, business vehicle, marine cargo, and commercial hull insurance. It offers car and home insurance also.

Many of Suncorp’s brands are recognised because they provide great customer experience when it comes to car insurance. You can find out which of these brands made our latest rankings of the best car insurers for customer satisfaction.

3. Insurance Australia Group Limited (IAG)

It's market cap: $11 billion

It's business type: Insurance company

It's business line: General insurance, reinsurance

It's headquarters: Sydney, NSW

IAG is also the country's biggest general insurer, controlling about a third of the market among the largest insurance companies in Australia based on market cap. Behind some of the nation’s prominent insurance brands, IAG is the umbrella organisation. These businesses underwrite premiums annually around $13 billion.

4. Medibank Private Limited

It's market cap: $8.95 billion

It's business type: Insurance company

It's business line: Private health insurance

It's headquarters: Melbourne, VIC

Based on customer satisfaction and the largest in terms of market share, controlling more than a quarter of the market, Medibank is among the top private health insurance companies in Australia. In addition to health policies, the insurer offers life, pet, and travel insurance. It moreover provides its 3.9 million customers with a variety of healthcare and wellness services. 

Unfortunately, the insurer has become an attractive target for cybercriminals due to Medibank’s scale and the sensitivity of the information it handles. Medibank was recently a victim of a ransomware attack, that compromised the personal details of its clients.

5. Steadfast Group Limited

It's market cap: $5.93 billion

It's business type: Insurance broker network

It's business line: General insurance 

It's headquarters: Sydney, NSW

In Australia and New Zealand, Steadfast is the largest insurance broker network bringing together 417 general insurance brokerages under one prominent brand. Steadfast network brokers have access to more than 160 commercial and personal insurance products. For the country’s SME insurance market Steadfast partners have written more than $11.5 billion in gross written premiums.

6. nib Holdings Limited

It's market cap: $3.38 billion

It's business type: Insurance company

It's business line: Private health insurance

It's headquarters: Newcastle, NSW

nib is a global private health insurance provider offers a variety of healthcare and medical coverage to over 1.5 million policyholders in Australia and New Zealand, and more than 190,000 international students and foreign workers in the country. The company astands out among the top travel insurers in Australia and distributes travel policies worldwide through the nib Travel brand.

7. AUB Group Limited

It's market cap: $2.54 billion

It's business type: Insurance broker network

It's business line: General insurance

It's headquarters: Sydney, NSW

AUB Group has a variety of networks including insurance brokers, underwriting agencies, and risk management service providers, that caters to more than 900,000 clients across Australia and New Zealand. For policyholders across the country and internationally, it has written over $4.4 billion in gross written premiums placing it among the largest insurance companies in Australia.

AUB’s businesses are divided into several branches. These are:

Australian broking: It consists of brokerages operating across the country and provides insurance broking and risk advisory services to SME clients.

Non-broking services: Non-broking services offers complementary services for insurance brokerage and insurance agency partners, including claims, loss adjustment, management and investigation, and legal support.

Austbrokers member services: Austbrokers member services deliver products, services, and business support to partner brokers.

Underwriting agencies: Underwriting agencies design, manage, and distribute insurance products and portfolios on behalf of licensed insurers.

New Zealand: New Zealand operates as NZbrokers which the biggest broker management group in New Zealand.

BizCover: BizCover is a digital insurance platform for SMEs offering multichannel presence and comprehensive product offerings.

The Insurance Alliance (TIA): The Insurance Alliance is a non-equity model from independent brokers which is designed to take advantage of AUB’s capabilities and offerings.

8. PSC Insurance Group Limited

It's market cap: $1.73 billion

It's business type: Insurance services group

It's business line: General insurance

It's headquarters: Sydney, NSW

PSC is a diversified insurance services group having operations in Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and Hong Kong. It has more than 40 trading businesses. PSC’s key businesses include:

PSC Insurance Brokers: PSC Insurance Brokers offers commercial insurance broking services to nationwide customers. The unit has 16 offices and over 80,000 clients across the country.

PSC Network Insurance Partners: PSC Network Insurance Partners is a network of more than 200 authorised representatives that provides services to over 100,000 clients in Australia and New Zealand.

Life insurance broking & workers' compensation consulting: This Life insurance consulting for broking & workers' compensation provides full-service capabilities to those clients who are Australian.

PSC also operates several specialty businesses. They include:

Chase Underwriting: Chase Underwriting offers underwriting services in the industries for construction and plant and equipment.

Breeze Underwriting: Breeze Underwriting provides services of underwriting in the field of equipment hire, accommodation, hospitality and professional risks sectors.

Medisure Indemnity: Medisure Indemnity offers underwriting services to clients in the field of medical and healthcare in industries.

Online travel insurance: It consists of multiple brands.

9. Tower Limited

It's market cap: $204.9 million
It's business type: Insurance company
It's business line: General insurance
It's headquarters: Auckland, New Zealand.

Tower operates in New Zealand and seven Pacific Island nations. Tower’s product range covers all aspects of general insurance along with several specialised policies across different categories. Its home and contents insurance includes specialised policies for car, landlord, business, pet, and travel coverage. The Kiwi insurer also offers specialised motorbike, boat, block and farm, and caravan policies that cover policyholders for everything from damages caused by natural calamities to loss of income and fire replacement. Tower is the last New Zealand general insurer that has been listed in the ASX.

10. NobleOak Life Limited

It's market cap: $155.2 million
It's business type: Insurance company
It's business line: Life insurance
It's headquarters: Sydney, NSW.

NobleOak Life provides comprehensive life insurance as well as a range of other policies to clients across the country. The company’s products are available through associations, financial advisers, and its business partners.

Based on market cap, here is a summary of the 10 largest insurance companies and brokerages in Australia .

Summary of 10 largest insurance companies in Australia

Market capitalisation, also referred to as market cap, relates to the total value of a publicly traded company’s outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. This metric shows how much a business is worth as determined by the stock market. By multiplying the number of outstanding shares by the current market value of a single share, you can calculate a company’s market cap . For this list, from the ASX website, we pulled market capitalisation data. 

A firm’s market capitalisation plays an important role in determining its size, without having to collect data about its sales figures or total assets. Investors often use market cap in order to evaluate a company’s financial performance against firms of varying sizes. This metric foretells if a business presents a safe or risky investment opportunity.

Firms which have a large market cap are typically financially stable and naturally carry less risk for investors. Companies that have smaller caps, on the other hand, are often riskier to invest in, though they offer huge potential rewards, especially if they post tremendous growth.

But what does market cap stands for the insurance community? Market cap can help insurance professionals and customers realize if an insurer is secure enough to meet its financial obligations. For those persons looking for a job in insurance, large cap companies can be chosen because they provide a stable workplace.

Australian insurers, however, stands for a small portion of the world’s insurance giants. You can check out our latest global rankings of the largest insurance companies in the world If you want to find out the largest insurance companies in the world.

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