The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has put a number on what trade credit brokers have been sensing for weeks. In its April 2026 World Economic Outlook, the fund warned that a prolonged war between the US, Israel and Iran - and the energy supply shock that would come with it - could drag global growth close to the 2% threshold that marks a global recession, a line crossed only four times since 1980. Oxford Economics has gone further, putting the probability of a worldwide downturn at close to one in two.

For global insurers and brokers, the macro picture collapses into a single, pressing commercial reality: non-payment risk is rising fast - and the window to insure it is closing.

Big concern for exporting clients: Payment risk

Trade and logistics specialist Mark Coleman (pictured left), director of International Customs and Logistics (ICAL), was blunt about the fallout from the conflict.

“Over the last two weeks, the biggest concern for exporting clients has been payment risk,” he said.

Coleman pointed to heavy exposure in agribusiness, where large volumes are being shipped to counterparties whose financial position is often opaque. "You can look them up on the internet and see a very polished website but that does not reveal their financial situation," he said, adding that payments that used to land within three or four days of departure were now blowing out to one or two weeks -a cash-flow shock for exporters already operating on tight margins.

Importers are not insulated either. Coleman said while there is no direct non-payment exposure for a buyer, the risk that a supplier collapses mid-shipment because of cash flow stress is now material on both sides of the ledger.

That deterioration is visible in the hard data, and it is a global story. Allianz Trade forecasts global business insolvencies will rise 5% in 2026 - a fifth consecutive year of increases that will leave bankruptcies 24% above their pre-pandemic average. Year-to-date 2025 data already shows insolvencies up 38% in Italy and 26% in Switzerland, with Asia recording a 39% year-on-year jump. The US and China are set to drive much of next year's rise, with forecast increases of 8 and 10% respectively. Allianz Trade estimates the Middle East conflict alone will add 15,000 global business failures over 2026 and 2027, with a prolonged Strait of Hormuz blockade potentially lifting next year's increase to 10%.

Australia and New Zealand sit firmly inside that pattern. Apolline Greiveldinger (pictured centre), Coface's economist for Australia and New Zealand, said that persistent Middle East tensions were adding inflationary pressure and raising the risk of a stronger tightening cycle from the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) - higher borrowing costs that would feed straight back into local insolvency numbers. The sensitivity she describes is not unique to Canberra: Coface has warned globally that a 25-basis-point rise in business lending rates, beyond what markets are already pricing, would be enough to push insolvency growth back towards 4% to 5% in 2026, wiping out the fragile deceleration currently forecast. The IMF, for its part, has flagged deteriorating conditions across emerging Asia and parts of the Middle East - precisely the buyer markets that Australian, New Zealand, European and North American exporters are shipping into. For brokers, that is the context every trade credit conversation now starts with: a buyer universe that is weakening simultaneously in almost every major export market.

The broker's playbook: get ahead of the claim

In response to this economic gloom, Coleman encourages brokers to be proactive.

“Don't wait until the payment becomes a problem, be proactive, do research on your client, [and] look for insurance for non-payment because it is going to become an issue this year for a lot of companies,” he said.

Trade credit underwriters typically pull or reduce limits on buyers as risk deteriorates - meaning brokers who wait for clients to ask will increasingly find cover unavailable or unaffordable by the time the conversation happens.

David Jovanov (pictured right), Coface's head of business information sales, Australia and New Zealand, said clients may find that “getting insurance on some of these customers may be challenging” and “getting security after the point can be challenging as well.” A reminder that forward-looking risk data and early underwriting engagement are now front-of-list priorities for brokers.

The operational backdrop only compounds the urgency. Coleman said freight is “a mess for the next three months on the sea freight side.” Shipments to Jeddah are stretching from six weeks to three months and Dubai's 16-million-container-a-year flow is being redirected through smaller ports like Khor Fakkan and Fujairah that were never designed to absorb it. Every extra day at sea is a day of additional counterparty, inventory and currency exposure - all of which should be surfaced in broker risk reviews.

Disruption and opportunity

This reshaping of trade flows brings problems for global insurers and their customers but it also creates genuine openings for exporters able to move quickly. Coleman said that where Middle Eastern suppliers have historically served Asian, European or American buyers, Australian and New Zealand exporters now have a chance to step in - often at a premium price. "Any time something wrong happens, there's an opportunity," he said.

For brokers, that could be the growth opportunity hiding inside the risk story. Exporters chasing new buyers in unfamiliar markets will need credit limits written against counterparties they have never traded with before - a classic trade credit insurance use case, and one that plays directly to brokers who can combine underwriting capacity with buyer intelligence.

Despite the IMF's recession warnings, the trade credit message is sharper but suggests business opportunities for brokers and insurers. The non-payment risk is now a live exposure sitting on exporters' balance sheets but brokers who move their clients from reactive to proactive and pair cover with forward-looking counterparty data can own this cycle. Those who wait could find that by the time payment becomes a problem, insurance can no longer provide the answer.