Insurer Capital Markets Counsel in 2026: The Specialist Barely Leads

A general counsel looking for capital markets lawyers for insurance companies is choosing between two kinds of bench, and the record shows insurers use both in nearly equal measure. Sartori & Partners data show 802 insurer deals in the 12 months to October 2026. Insurance and reinsurance lawyers worked on 29.9% of them and capital markets lawyers on 27.1%, a gap of 2.8 points. Corporate and M&A lawyers follow at 25.2%. One deal can involve several practices, so these shares overlap, and a deal without a practice label counts in none of them. The practical question for an insurer is not which practice owns the account, but which of the two benches a given mandate actually needs.

Set against the whole deal record, the two practices behave in opposite ways. Capital markets lawyers sit on 27.1% of insurer deals and on 26.4% of all dated deals, a difference of 0.7 points: insurers use the generalist at about the rate every other client does. Insurance and reinsurance lawyers appear on just 0.7% of all deals, yet on 29.9% of insurer deals. Seen from the specialist's side, insurers are the client sector on 75.7% of that practice's deals. Banks lean much harder on the generalist: capital markets lawyers worked on 51.0% of bank deals. For an insurer, that means a capital markets firm brings the same issuance machinery it uses for any client, while the sector knowledge sits with a much narrower group of lawyers who work almost only for insurers.

By deal type, disputes and investigations come first for insurers at 30.2% of the sector's deals, against 25.0% across the whole record. Capital markets deals are 26.6% of insurer deals, close to the all-deals figure of 25.7%, while M&A runs higher at 24.4% against 19.3%. The specialist practice's own mix points the same way: disputes and investigations are on 63.4% of the specialist practice's deals. Where a value was disclosed, the median insurer deal was $750 million, against $563.2 million for capital markets deals in every sector, although only 20.4% of insurer deals carried a value. The split matters when building a panel: the specialist bench is largely a contentious bench, so an insurer raising capital should not assume its coverage or reinsurance firm also runs offerings.

New York is the main base, with lawyers there on 40.2% of insurer deals that have a known lawyer location. London follows at 22.9%, against 16.0% of bank deals, a gap of 6.9 points. Chicago is the other city where insurers stand out, at 10.7% against 5.6% for banks, while Washington sits level at 13.6% and 13.7%. A deal with lawyers in two cities counts in both, so these figures show where the work is done and are never added up. An insurer with a London market presence or a reinsurance program should expect a real part of its work to run through a London team, and should ask who in that office leads rather than supports.

Year on year, the insurer deal count held flat (+1.3%), from 783 to 793 in the settled 12-month windows. Over the same windows the capital markets practice's deal count rose 10.0%, from 11,838 to 13,024, and the full deal record rose 10.6%. The specialist practice moved too: the insurance and reinsurance practice's deal count rose 16.6%, from 259 to 302, on a much smaller base. Sartori & Partners counts these as matters on record, so the comparison describes activity, not fees. The consequence for an insurer is about attention: the capital markets partners it relies on are carrying more work from other sectors than a year ago, while its own volume has not grown, so its claim on their calendar is weaker than it was.

Lateral moves of capital markets lawyers between firms held flat (+6.7%), from 571 to 609 in the settled windows; these are moves of lawyers, not deals. Partner moves in the practice also held flat (+1.1%), from 183 to 185. Most of that hiring goes to large firms: 69.1% of capital markets lateral moves went to firms with 1,000+ lawyers. Set beside the practice's growing deal count, steady hiring means the same partners are spread across more work; it is a pairing of two trends, not a cause. Companies also hire from this pool: in the latest 6 months, 47 capital markets lawyers left firms for companies, or 14 for every hundred lateral moves between firms. For an insurer weighing an in-house capital markets hire, the pool is competitive and drawn mostly from large firms, so expect a long search and a large-firm salary benchmark.

First, staff by mandate rather than by sector label. With insurance and reinsurance lawyers on 29.9% of insurer deals and capital markets lawyers on 27.1%, neither bench covers the sector alone, and the specialist's work leans toward disputes. Second, judge capital markets counsel on issuance experience across clients, since insurers use that practice at close to the market rate. Third, check the London bench: lawyers there worked on 22.9% of insurer deals. Fourth, secure partner time early, because the practice's deal count rose 10.0% while lateral hiring in the practice did not keep pace. The list below counts all of the sector's deal work, every practice included; there is no separate ranking for capital markets work on insurer deals. Four of its names, Sidley Austin, Davis Polk & Wardwell, A&O Shearman and Latham & Watkins, also rank in the capital markets practice's ten across all sectors. Sartori & Partners builds these figures from public law-firm announcements, firm websites and professional profiles, checked monthly.