Beazley has issued a stark assessment of the global risk landscape heading into next year, warning that businesses face an “era of accelerating risk” across cyber security, energy and geopolitics.
A series of predictions for next year’s commercial risk environment, unveiled at its London HQ, drew on global executive sentiment and the insurer’s forward-looking analysis.
Geopolitical instability, trade disruption and the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) are now converging to create unprecedented complexity for risk managers and insurance buyers, the specialty insurer observed.
Cyber kill shot
One of the sharpest warnings comes on cyber.
Beazley highlights that perceptions of cyber risk have risen steadily since 2021, with high-profile incidents, including the CrowdStrike outage and a cyber-attack on Jaguar Land Rover, reshaping boardroom priorities.
The report noted that the JLR incident “shaved an estimated 0.2% off UK GDP in September,” underscoring the systemic potential of cyber failures.
For its first prediction, Beazley warns that “2026 could be the year a major business suffers significant long-term damage or even failure from an outage caused by a cyber-attack or error.”
That prediction reflects a belief that cyber shocks are now large enough to trigger severe operational and financial distress for global brands.
Nuclear fusion
The insurer also raises concerns about transition risk as countries accelerate decarbonisation, regulatory regimes shift and investment patterns change.
It reports that “around a quarter of global executives predict that the energy transition will be the biggest risk facing their business in January 2026.”
Beazley argues that 2026 may also bring major scientific milestones.
The insurer predicts 2026 “we will be the year we learn of the success of the first tests of commercial nuclear fusion plants.”
Fusion developments, if confirmed, would “redraw long-term energy markets and geopolitical relationships.”
AI Luddites
Geopolitics remains another major driver of uncertainty, and Beazley came up with two predictions that ties geopolitical risk together with core financial results as well as the social effects of AI.
The insurer observed that 88% of global executives it polled now believe that geopolitical and economic volatility will limit their growth plans, a sharp rise from the start of the year.
Beazley anticipates a growing backlash against AI, suggesting that “2026 [will be] the year of the AI Luddite”
Two primary reasons were given for this: rising concerns over AI’s energy consumption; and the technology’s social impact on employment.
The Luddite term refers to Victorian social unrest during the first Industrial Revolution, as dissatisfied workers turned to machine-breaking and political violence.
Bealey warns of a “spillover into attacks on data centres and AI assets,” indicating that political and societal tensions may evolve into physical or digital threats.
Geopolitics hits finance
Bealey frames these trends within a broader shift in global financial markets.
The London market insurer argued that “financial markets will no longer only be about interest rates and inflation”.
Future investment decisions instead “will be about geopolitics, credibility and resilience”, the insurer suggested.
The theme of resilience runs throughout the analysis.
“We are entering a year where resilience will matter more than ever,” the report warned.
Organisations capable of adapting quickly “will be best placed to withstand the world in flux,” Beazley added.
Marking last year’s homework
Beazley’s CEO, Adrian Cox, presenting the predictions at the insurer’s London market headquarters, observed that of its predictions 12 months ago, its focus on energy transition was furthest from the mark.
Giving itself a “B+” grade on whether energy transition had been a focus in 2025, Cox observed that “fragmentation in international regulation is real – but progress continues”.
Its two other predictions a year ago proved prescient, Cox suggested.
On trade disruption, he graded last year’s prediction an ‘A’, adding “tariffs and geopolitics have disrupted trade routes”.
The other prediction a year ago was around “AI washing”, a deceptive practice of firms exaggerating their solutions’ use of AI to attract customers, investors or boost reputation.
Cox marked that one as an ‘A’, suggesting Beazley’s “warnings proved timely”.
