Insurance companies' premium volume in Kuwait declined by 9% in the fiscal year ended 31 March 2025 (FY2025) with the health insurance branch reporting a notable drop, according to the sector's regulator.
The combined direct insurance premiums of insurers in Kuwait reached KWD616.2m ($2bn) in FY2025, down from KWD678.7m in the preceding year, a 9.2% drop, according to the Insurance Regulatory Unit (IRU) fifth Annual Report for the 2024-2025 financial year, released last week.
The overall fall in total business is attributed largely to the sharp decline (20.5%) in health insurance premiums, which reached KWD277m in FY2025 from KWD348.3m in FY2024. Health insurance premiums accounted for 45% of the market's overall operations in FY2025, down from 51.3% in FY2024.
Compulsory motor insurance, which accounted for around 7% of the combined market operations, was the fastest-growing line of business as its premiums reached KWD42.3m in FY2025, 23% higher than the KWD34.3m in FY2024. Comprehensive motor insurance business, which commanded almost 16% of total premium income, grew by only 1.2%.
Marine and aviation insurance businesses grew by 13% to around KWD23m from KWD20m. Premiums of the other non-life insurance lines of business saw negative growth.
On the other hand, life insurance premiums grew by 5.3% to reach KWD67.4m (around 11% of the market gross direct premiums) in FY2025 from KWD64m in FY2024.
Paid claims in the insurance market reached KWD417m in FY2025 compared to KWD470m in the previous year, a decrease of 11%. Health insurance paid claims, which represented 64% of the market’s total paid claims, dropped by 21% to KWD266.7m in FY2025 from KWD338.5m in FY2024.
The IRU data show that domestic insurers’ direct premiums dropped by 10% to KWD552.1m in FY2025 from KWD620.2m in the previous year. Foreign insurance companies, on the other hand, saw their premiums grow by almost 10%.
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Kuwait Insurance Market Performance by line of business for the fiscal year ended 31 March 2025 (FY2025)
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|
KWD’ 000
|
Direct insurance premiums
|
Paid claims
|
|
Line of business
|
FY2024
|
FY2025
|
Change
|
Share of FY2025 total
|
FY2024
|
FY2025
|
Change
|
Share of FY2025 total
|
|
Motor comprehensive
|
94,697
|
95,850
|
1.2%
|
15.6%
|
55,831
|
63,270
|
13.3%
|
15.2%
|
|
Motor TPL
|
34,350
|
42,292
|
23.1%
|
6.9%
|
11,645
|
13,906
|
19.4%
|
3.3%
|
|
Health
|
348,349
|
276,986
|
-20.5%
|
45.0%
|
338,481
|
266,713
|
-21.2%
|
63.9%
|
|
Fire
|
52,661
|
49,859
|
-5.3%
|
8.1%
|
8,385
|
13,928
|
66.1%
|
3.3%
|
|
Marine/Aviation
|
20,109
|
22,845
|
13.0%
|
3.7%
|
5,171
|
3,348
|
-35.2%
|
0.8%
|
|
Other-accidents
|
62,961
|
59,479
|
-5.5%
|
9.7%
|
14,469
|
17,072
|
18.0%
|
4.1%
|
|
Travel
|
1,475
|
1,439
|
-2.5%
|
0.2%
|
263
|
65
|
-75.4%
|
0.0%
|
|
Life (group)
|
53,354
|
57,118
|
7.1%
|
9.3%
|
34,762
|
37,155
|
6.9%
|
8.9%
|
|
Life (individual)
|
10,684
|
10,310
|
-3.5%
|
1.7%
|
1,072
|
1,609
|
50.1%
|
0.4%
|
|
Total
|
678,741
|
616,176
|
-9.2%
|
100.0%
|
470,079
|
417,067
|
-11.3%
|
100.0%
|
|
Source:
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Insurance Regulatory Unit
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In a statement, IRU head Mohammad Al-Otaibi pointed out that while the value of direct premiums of domestic insurers decreased although the number of issued policies increased to 1.8m in FY2025 (from 1.6m in the preceding year). He said that the insurance market still needs more changes, including the implementation of new premium rates for compulsory insurance branches.