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The story
Founded by Carl von Thieme and Wilhelm von Finck on Apr 3, 1880, in Munich.1
History
In 1880 Carl von Thieme, a native of Erfurt who was the representative in Bavaria of his father's Thuringia insurance company, founded in Munich Münchener Rückversicherungs-Gesellschaft together with Wilhelm von Finck (co-owner of the Merck Finck & Co. bank) and Theodor von Cramer-Klett. This was followed by the founding of Allianz Versicherungs-Gesellschaft in 1890 in Berlin. Carl von Thieme was head of Munich Re until 1921, and Wilhelm von Finck served as Chairman of the supervisory board until 1924. Munich Re became renowned after the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 as the only insurer that remained solvent after paying out all the claims, a total of 15.5 million Marks.
During the Nazi dictatorship Munich Re benefited from anti-Semitic persecution. Jewish customers had to cancel their life insurance policies prematurely leading to huge profits for the insurance companies. At the same time Munich Re could acquire several properties owned by Jews at prices below the market rate. Starting from 1940 the company was involved in Allianz' insurance business with the SS: Munich Re served as reinsurance company for contracts insuring the barracks and operations in the concentration and extermination camps Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau, Neuengamme, Ravensbrück, Sachsenhausen and Stutthof. Supervisory board member Kurt Schmitt joined the NSDAP and SS in 1933 and took the position as Reich Economy Minister for one year. In 1938 he became Director General of Munich Re and stayed in this position until the American military authorities relieved him of all offices at the end of the war.
In February 2010, U.S. investor Warren Buffett became Munich Re's largest single shareholder. As of December 2015, he reduced his holdings to less than 3 percent.
In 2025, the company's shareholders' equity amounted to €32.75 billion. The group's premium income for the year (gross premiums written) was €60.4 billion, with its consolidated result amounting to €6.12 million.
Munich Re Foundation
The Munich Re Foundation is a charitable organisation, which was founded by Munich Re; the foundation started its work on 7 April 2005.
The foundation is equipped with a capital of €50 million and works predominantly in newly industrializing and developing countries. The main topics of the foundation are:
Environmental and climatic changes
Microinsurance and poverty reduction
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Water as a resource and risk factor
Disaster prevention.
The prime concern of the foundation is to develop solutions for people at risk. The knowledge of Munich Re's experts should therefore be translated into action. Hence, the working motto of the foundation is 'Munich Re Foundation – from knowledge to action'.
The main activities of the foundation concentrate on four fields: knowledge accumulation and implementation, clarification and sensitisation, networking of experts as well as direct help and support of local projects.
The foundation works with local, national as well as international partners. The majority of projects fit within a global framework. Since adaptation to climate and environmental change is much more difficult for poorer countries, the focus of the foundation is primarily on people in the developing world.
From Wikipedia’s article on Munich Re, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5