Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc. MMC

The business

Marsh McLennan sells advice and intermediation across risk and people. Two segments carry it. Risk and Insurance Services (Marsh commercial brokerage plus Guy Carpenter reinsurance) is the engine: about 63% of revenue and the higher-margin half of the house, earning commissions and fees on the premium volume it places for corporations, governments, and insurers. Consulting (Mercer in health, wealth, and career; Oliver Wyman in strategy) is the other 37%. The whole thing is capital-light, fee-based, and sticky, with client retention above 90% and revenue that recurs off multi-year relationships. The segment doing most of the work today is Risk and Insurance Services, at roughly 63% of revenue and the bulk of operating profit, with Marsh brokerage the single largest line inside it.

What the financials do not show is the pricing backdrop. Marsh rode a hard commercial-insurance market from 2020 through 2023, when rates rose and organic growth ran high single digits; that cycle has softened, and FY25 organic growth landed near 4%, the low end of the recent range. The other moving piece is McGriff, the roughly $7.75 billion US retail-brokerage acquisition closed in late 2024 and funded almost entirely with debt. That deal pushed net debt to about $18.8B and changed the capital-return rhythm: the share buyback was effectively paused in 2025 to pay the deal down, which matters to the per-share math more than the headline organic rate.