De-clawed Cats hiss in 2025, but claims payouts don’t scare anyone

Insured losses from catastrophic events across Canada in 2025 totalled $2.4 billion, a far cry from 2024’s $9.1 billion and “on the lower end of the past five years of annual loss totals,” says Catastrophe Indices and Quantification Inc. (CatIQ).

But despite being the tenth largest loss year on record and a “welcome reprieve” from 2024, last year was anything but typical, says CatIQ president and CEO Laura Twidle.

“We saw the highest number of fire-related Cats declared, and, perhaps more notably these all occurred in provinces that had never had a prior industry fire catastrophe,” Twidle says in a press release Tuesday.

“Those events came after a string of quiet catastrophes that saw the year start with a series of snow- and melt-related events in southern Ontario and Quebec, culminating with a major ice storm that drove almost a quarter of the year’s losses,” Twidle adds. “With 17 events overall, the year is now tied in second for the largest number of catastrophes declared, demonstrating that even a ‘slow’ year brings its own challenges.”

Canadian Underwriter asked Glenn McGillivray, managing director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction (ICLR), why there were so many Cats declared but such relatively tame total losses.

“It’s often about location,” McGillivray says. “In 2024, three of four major losses occurred in three of Canada’s largest cities — Toronto, Montreal and Calgary.

“In 2025, this didn’t happen.”

Despite overall trends of more and larger losses, annual loss trends are never linear and “don’t go up in a nice, even manner,” he adds. “We still have good years and bad. Seventeen events equals a very active year, but overall losses were tamer than other years (like 2024).”

Ice storm tops list

The costliest event in 2025 was the ice storm that struck Ontario and Quebec in late March, resulting in nearly a quarter of the annual total at $490 million of catastrophic insured loss. This ice storm becomes the second costliest on record, behind the 1998 ice storm which is estimated to have caused $2.3 billion.

Using CatIQ data, Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC) reports the second largest severe weather event in 2025 was the Flin Flon, Man. and La Ronge, Sask. wildfires at $300 million, Prairie severe storms at $235 million, a Calgary hailstorm at $160 million and the B.C. atmospheric river at $90 million.

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When it comes to wildfire losses, 2025 was the second worst wildfire season in Canadian history, with more than 6,000 wildfires in nearly every province and territory, Public Safety Canada reported last October. But that seemingly didn’t translate into substantial losses.

“Up to quite recently, virtually all insured wildfire losses occurred in B.C. and Alberta only,” McGillivray adds. Then, in 2023, there was a sizeable insured loss in the Greater Halifax Area.

“In 2025, we had substantial wildfire losses in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. This underscores that wildfire is a Canadian issue, not just a B.C. and Alberta issue.”

Intensifying severe weather

Severe weather events continue to intensify. Two decades ago, insured losses seldom surpassed $500 million in a year, IBC president and CEO Celyeste Power notes in the association’s release. Today, annual costs exceeding $1 billion have become the norm.

“This shift demands that we fundamentally rethink how we build, plan and restore communities across our country,” she says. “The best way to keep communities safe and insurance widely available and affordable is to invest seriously in resilience now.”

Between 2006 and 2015, Canada’s annual insured losses due to catastrophic weather events and wildfires totalled $14 billion, adjusted for inflation. By contrast, between 2016 and 2025, annual insured losses due to these events totalled $37 billion — nearly tripling the previous decade. The average number of claims have nearly doubled over this same time span, IBC adds.

The summer of 2024 also saw four new Top 10 costliest events totalling about $8 billion in losses. Is it safe to say we dodged a bullet in 2025?

“Insured losses in 2024 did a good job of illustrating what is possible, particularly as cities continue to grow, replacement values continue upward, and our climate continues to warm,” McGillivray tells CU. “We always dodge bullets, any given Cat year could have always been worse.”

According to ICLR, uninsured losses added $1 billion to 2025’s Cat totals, bringing “total societal loss to $3.4 billion and counting,” CatIQ reports.

Based on 43 years of data, insurance covers about 54% of societal losses. The 2025 total societal loss is below the long-term trend, currently $9.1 billion per year and growing 9% annually after inflation.

Jason Contant

Jason has been an award-winning journalist with Canadian Underwriter for more than a decade, including the past three years as associate editor and, before that, as digital editor for seven years.