It's Another Year of Costly Disasters

A surge of wildfires and powerful storms has already driven global natural-disaster losses to more than $131 billion in just the first half of 2025. While that figure is down from the $155 billion tallied over the same period last year, it remains well above the long-term averages, reflecting a trend of increasingly costly disaster seasons, CBS News reports. The bulk of this year's losses stem from the Los Angeles-area wildfires, which alone accounted for $53 billion in damages, with $40 billion covered by insurance, according to the report from insurance company Munich Re. (That's in line with a separate report from Redfin, per the Los Angeles Times.) Scientists noted climate change's role in amplifying fire conditions, leading to more severe and destructive blazes.

Overall, of the $131 billion in losses so far in 2025, $80 billion was insured, marking the second-highest insured loss for a six-month span since records began in 1980. Only 2011, which included Japan's devastating earthquake and tsunami, saw more. Other significant events this year included a deadly 7.7-magnitude earthquake in Myanmar that killed about 4,500 people and caused $12 billion in losses, with only a small fraction of that insured. A string of US storms from March to May also contributed significantly, racking up around $19 billion in total losses. Munich Re's analysts emphasized that as populations grow in high-risk areas and weather extremes intensify, largely due to climate change, such losses are likely to keep rising.