Where Actuarial Jobs Are Going: Bermuda and Central Eastern Europe Lead the Way

Guest article written by Sarah Schadek-Keane, Managing Director – International Actuarial, Underwriting & Claims, Emerald Group 

The Shifting  Map of Actuarial Opportunity

The global actuarial job market is undergoing a significant geographic reorientation. While traditional European financial hubs — most notably Switzerland — are experiencing labour market contraction and cautious hiring conditions, two regions are clearly bucking that trend: Bermuda and Central Eastern Europe (CEE). For actuaries at any stage of their career, understanding where demand is growing and why is the single most important step in building a future-proof career strategy.

Bermuda: The World’s Risk Capital Is Hungry for Talent

Bermuda has long held a unique status in global insurance. Home to some of the highest concentrations of actuaries per capita anywhere on earth, the island has been the world’s premier centre for catastrophe reinsurance, specialty insurance, and alternative risk transfer for decades. But rather than plateau-ing, Bermuda’s appetite for actuarial talent is intensifying.

A Market in Expansion Mode

The numbers tell a compelling story. AM Best reported that Bermudian reinsurers recorded capital growth of 16% in 2024, accounting for 15% of total global reinsurance capital, which reached $500 billion. New players continue to set up operations, drawn by Bermuda’s streamlined regulatory framework under the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA), its zero income tax environment, and its strategic position as the gateway for US-facing reinsurance business. Particularly notable is the rapid expansion of two sub-sectors: life reinsurance and run-off/legacy acquisition. Previously a niche area of the island’s market, life reinsurance has seen a wave of new entrants establishing operations. Simultaneously, the run-off sector — where firms acquire and manage closed insurance book portfolios — has grown dramatically, as insurers across Europe and North America seek to shed legacy liabilities and improve solvency ratios. Each new entrant needs actuaries. Because a significant proportion of Bermuda’s deal activity must legally be conducted on-island, remote work has limits. This keeps the physical demand for resident actuaries high and the market competitive. For actuaries with 5-10 years of experience, Bermuda offers an unusually fast path to senior responsibility. With multiple firms competing for a limited pool of qualified professionals, experienced actuaries regularly find themselves stepping into Associate Actuary or even lead roles earlier than they might in larger, more established markets.

Central Eastern Europe: The Quiet Powerhouse

While Bermuda generates the headlines, Central Eastern Europe has become one of the most significant and fastest-growing markets for actuarial employment globally, driven by a different but equally powerful set of forces.

Why CEE?

The region — encompassing Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, and neighbouring countries — has benefited enormously from a structural trend within multinational insurers and reinsurers: the establishment of Centres of Excellence (CoEs). Cost-effective, well-educated, and geographically and culturally close to Western European decision-makers, CEE cities have become the operational backbone for actuarial functions that were previously based in London, Zurich, Frankfurt, or Paris. This is not outsourcing in the traditional sense. These are genuinely high-skilled, high-responsibility roles — teams performing IFRS 17 reporting, Solvency II valuations, assumption reviews, pricing modelling, and enterprise risk work — but based in Warsaw rather than Zurich.

What CEE Offers Career-Wise

For young actuaries, CEE hubs are excellent starting points. The work is genuinely international in scope — you will be working with data, models, and colleagues from across Europe and beyond — while the cost of living remains much lower than in Western European capitals. Exam support, structured development programmes, and hybrid working are common features. For those with more years of experience, the CoE model presents a specific opportunity: the chance to step into a leadership or senior specialist role within a major multinational’s regional hub, often with broader EMEA or global visibility than you would have in a comparable role in a congested Western European market.

It is important to understand the context in which Bermuda and CEE are flourishing. Traditional actuarial strongholds — particularly Switzerland — are in a period of contraction rather than expansion.

The Swiss job market recorded a year-on-year decline in vacancies of around 5–6% through 2025, with finance and mathematics-related professionals among the groups most affected. For actuaries eyeing a Swiss-based role, the market is competitive in the wrong direction — for candidates, not employers. Germany and other mature Western European markets face similar dynamics, with actuarial work increasingly being redistributed eastward into lower-cost CoE structures or more in need of local talent for the local market than offering a truly international role.
None of this means Switzerland or Germany are without opportunity; senior and highly specialised roles still exist. But for an actuary weighing up where the career momentum is, the direction of travel is clear.

The actuarial profession is fortunate to be one of the most internationally mobile careers in financial services. The skills are portable, the qualifications are recognised globally, and the demand — in the right places — is strong and growing. In 2026 and beyond, those right places are Bermuda and Central Eastern Europe. Knowing that is half the battle; acting on it is the other half.