Facing Disaster and Building Resilience through Shining Light Companies

by Colin Craig, MBA, CSRIC®

For many of us, 2025 began just like any other new year. Fresh fitness resolutions replaced feasting, and a return to normalcy followed the hustle and bustle of family gatherings and office holiday parties. But for many families in Southern California, January of 2025 changed everything. Just a few days into the new year, the Palisades and Eaton fires ravaged communities across the region, destroying 16,246 structures (many of which were homes), and claiming 31 lives. The two infernos burned approximately 59 square miles, and it was roughly a month before both fires were extinguished.¹

Natural disasters – whether it be wildfires, floods, hurricanes, tornados, or tsunamis – are a reminder that something is off in this world. Natural disasters pointedly remind us that creation is, as Paul puts it in Romans 8, “subjected to futility” and in “bondage to corruption.” In other words, this isn’t how it should be.

And while it can be easy to get lost in high-level statistics about these massive disasters, we must not lose sight of the fact that these events impact the lives of ordinary people made in the image of God. Who can help these people when disaster strikes?

Insurance and Reinsurance

Whether it is fire damage to a residence covered under a traditional homeowners insurance policy, or property damage caused by natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods (typically covered under separate catastrophe insurance policies), insurance companies deploy a significant amount of capital to insured customers when disaster strikes. Whether it was through your health, life, disability, auto, or homeowners’ insurance, chances are high that you have had a financial burden eased by maintaining insurance coverage in some capacity. Insurance coverage transfers financial risk to another party in exchange for insurance premiums.

But how do insurance companies manage their risk exposures, ensuring that they have the liquidity necessary to cover liabilities when money is owed to insured customers? In addition to actuarial prowess and sophisticated investment portfolios, insurance companies also transfer risk to other insurance companies via a category of insurance products known as reinsurance. In other words, reinsurance is simply insurance for insurance companies. One industry organization puts it well:

“Reinsurance serves to limit liability on specific risks, to increase individual insurers’ capacity, to share liability when losses overwhelm the primary insurer’s resources, and to help insurers stabilize their business in the face of the wide swings in profit and loss margins inherent in the insurance business.”²

Notice how critical reinsurance is to the financial sustainability of insurance companies, and by extension, the global economy at large. Because risk is shared, insurance companies can increase their risk capacity (thus insuring more people), and these front-line insurance companies have more predictable profit and loss margins as a result of holding this coverage.

A Shining Light Company in the Reinsurance Industry

At Beacon Wealth Consultants, we seek to proactively tilt our clients’ investment portfolios toward companies that exhibit strong servant leadership, live out the “golden rule” in their business practices, demonstrate strong corporate governance, care for creation through environmental stewardship, and create compelling value through products and services that are offered. While each of these categories have implications for all our portfolio companies, I want to focus in on how one of our portfolio companies – Swiss Re – creates compelling value through the products and services it offers.

Swiss Re, as the name implies, is a Switzerland-based industry leader in reinsurance, insurance, insurance-based risk transfer, and other insurance related services. Founded in 1863, the Zurich-headquartered company employed nearly 15,000 employees with offices in 27 companies at the end of 2025.³ Supported by its Asset Management team, Swiss Re operates in several business lines: Property & Casualty Reinsurance, Life & Health Reinsurance, and Corporate Insurance, and Risk Data Solutions. Let’s take a closer look at the Property & Casualty Reinsurance Business Unit, which was the largest unit by revenue (44%) in 2025, with a focus on how it creates meaningful value for its clients.⁴

Sophisticated Property & Casualty Reinsurance Risk Management

Within its Property & Casualty Reinsurance business segment, Swiss Re provides reinsurance coverage to clients in industries as varied as agriculture to aviation, from cyber risks to marine risks (think cargo, fishing vessels, and offshore energy). Swiss Re even provides engineering reinsurance, facilitated by its global team of nearly 100 engineering experts!⁵ These are very real, consequential risks that many of us might not have even considered (at least those not employed in these particular industries), and yet significant disruptions in these industries can result in substantial economic waves. (Just look at the Strait of Hormuz’s closure in the first half of 2026 and the resulting oil price spike.)

What might be most interesting about this business segment, however, is Swiss Re’s vast property risk reinsurance capacity and risk insights which help clients understand risks present in their portfolios. In addition to their tailored Property & Casualty reinsurance solutions, Swiss Re employs more than 50 scientists who maintain their natural catastrophe risk models – models which cover more than 90% of the world’s insured exposures.⁶ These proprietary models are not only the bedrock of Swiss Re’s property reinsurance structured solutions, but they also are available to help clients better understand their risk exposures in their own insurance portfolios. The 160+ model suite enables clients to understand where their natural catastrophe risk exposures lie, the frequency of catastrophic events, and the intensity of such events. This data feed enables clients to more accurately set pricing, improve risk selection, and better understand costs.⁷

But why does better forecasting matter, and how does it promote human flourishing? While only God is sovereign and all-knowing (see Colossians 1:16-17, Proverbs 16:33, and Job 42:2), so much of our society and our daily lives are built upon making decisions based on relevant information.

For example, when meteorologists have issued a tornado warning, we know it probably is not a good time to go outside and get some fresh air! Forecasting – while imperfect – is critical to insurance companies’ decision-making, allowing them to better serve customers and society at large. And in addition to serving clients (other insurance companies), Swiss Re uses their risk knowledge to strengthen societal resilience in vulnerable communities abroad.

Fostering Resiliency Within Vulnerable Communities

The Swiss Re Foundation, the philanthropic wing of the company, strives to build resiliency in targeted developing regions as it “offers tailored financing, provides access to Swiss Re expertise, creates actionable evidence and amplifies impact with aligned partners to advance innovative solutions to global climate and health challenges.”⁸

Through the Foundation, Swiss Re supports entrepreneurial solutions in early, seed, and growth stages, with the goal of supporting these entrepreneurs beyond grant dependence and into sustainable revenue-based growth. The entrepreneurs that the Foundation funds align with their priority themes of “enhancing disaster risk reduction at the community level” (i.e. sustainability solutions), and “address inequalities and inefficiencies in people’s access to healthcare in underserved communities.”⁹

While countless examples exist (check them all out here!), let’s quickly review an interesting project that was completed in Malawi between 2023 to 2025. In rural areas of Malawi, a small country in southeastern Africa, access to healthcare is a challenge. Although public health facilities exist, they often lack resources and essential medicines, forcing villagers to visit private providers for help – if they can afford it.

Recognizing this unmet need, the Swiss Re Foundation provided capital to MicroInsurance Services (MIS) to expand access to healthcare in rural impoverished communities. MicroInsurance Services essentially bundles life and health insurance and adds this coverage to their micro-credit loans, providing coverage for around $1 USD per month. This low cost is essential in these low-income communities, where 90% of people live on less than $3 USD per day. Through the micro-insurance coverage, customers receive cash payouts for malaria (a common disease in this region), pregnancy, hospitalization, accidental disability, and death.¹⁰

You Can Make a Difference

We are thankful that Swiss Re and its Foundation are making a difference, not only throughout the global economy via reinsurance, but also in underserved and impoverished communities abroad. We are proud to invest in Shining Light Companies like Swiss Re, which create compelling value through the products and services offered.

To learn more about how you can invest in companies that are making a difference in the world today, reach out to our team today!

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