Global Markets · North America
Canada And The United States.
Two markets, one border, very different regulatory structures and a common cost trajectory. These are the markets Kempron builds for.
Canada
Not One Market, But Several
Canada is not a single motor insurance market. Ontario, Alberta and the Atlantic provinces operate private systems under provincial regulators. British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Manitoba operate public insurers. Quebec splits the system, handling bodily injury through a public scheme and leaving property damage with private insurers. Treating Canada as one market is wrong in at least three provinces. The supervisory detail is here.
Theft And Integrity
Équité Association reports approximately $900 million in auto theft insurance claims in 2025, despite an 18% year-over-year fall in theft volumes. National stolen-vehicle recovery stood at 59%, up from 58% in 2024, with wide regional variation: Ontario 51%, Quebec 48%, Alberta 71%. Vehicle finance fraud detected at the ports of Montreal and Halifax rose 72%. (Équité Association, 2025 Auto Theft Trend Report, 11 February 2026. Canadian dollars.)
Ontario alone accounted for $485 million of theft claims cost in 2025, down from $723 million in 2024 but with claim counts up 97% and losses up 330% since 2017. Toronto, Brampton and Mississauga were the province's three costliest cities at $114.5 million, $43.2 million and $31.6 million. (Insurance Bureau of Canada, 13 May 2026, using General Insurance Statistical Agency data.)
The Insurance Bureau of Canada estimates that insurance fraud costs Canadians well over $1 billion a year in added premiums. (Insurance Bureau of Canada, 2021. The most recent public IBC estimate we have located; read it as dated.)
The methodological shift matters more than the totals. Équité identifies a rise in vehicle finance fraud using identity theft and synthetic identities alongside re-VINing and chop-shop dismantling. (Équité Association, February 2026.) The attack has moved upstream, from the physical theft of a car to the documentary record that says who owns it.
United States
The Deepest Data, And The Tightest Labour Constraint
The United States is regulated state by state, with the National Association of Insurance Commissioners providing model laws that states adopt in varying forms. The supervisory detail is here. It is also the market with the deepest published claims data. Much of the repair-side evidence used here is American, and labelled as such.
Claims Cost
CCC Intelligent Solutions reports total loss frequency at 23.1% across all loss categories in 2025 and 23.9% for non-comprehensive claims, both records. For vehicles thirteen years or older, 45.3% of claims were written off. Average total cost of repair was $4,818, up 1.7%, with vehicles six years old or newer averaging $5,721 — $2,039, or 55.4%, more than vehicles seven years or older. Calibrations appeared on 28.3% of repairable estimates, up from 21.8%. (CCC Intelligent Solutions, Crash Course 2026, 31 March 2026. US dollars.)
Average paid bodily injury severity rose 10.3% over one year and 32% over four, while average collision delta-v has remained close to 2019 levels. Bodily injury now accounts for 52.4% of total liability dollars paid. (CCC Crash Course 2026, citing ISS Fast Track data.)
The Fleet And The Workforce
S&P Global Mobility put the average age of United States light vehicles at 12.8 years in 2025, an eighth consecutive annual increase. (S&P Global Mobility, 21 May 2025.) CCC notes roughly 14.3 million more vehicles in operation than in 2020 but over 12 million fewer aged six years or newer. (CCC Crash Course 2026, citing Experian to Q3 2025.)
The binding constraint is people. TechForce Foundation projects 73,354 new-entrant collision technicians needed between 2025 and 2029 against roughly 5,462 collision completions a year, with supply covering about 42% of annual demand and collision recording the highest turnover of ten sectors studied at 60.7%. (TechForce Foundation, Technician Supply, Demand & Opportunity Report, 2026.)
Enterprise Mobility reported collision-related length of rental at 15.5 days in the third quarter of 2025, down 0.9 days year over year but still above pre-pandemic levels. (Enterprise Mobility, US Length of Rental Q3 2025.)