Tokio Marine int’l rides investment gains to cover US nat cat bumps

Tokio Marine’s international units increased profits in non-life lines by 57% in original FX, driven chiefly by investment gains that covered , buoying a swing to losses in the group’s foreign life insurance units.

H1 net premiums written rose 8.7% year on year in original FX, including 5.5% growth in the core North American market, behind 24% growth in Europe and in South & Central America, both considerably smaller markets for the group.

Within North America, unit Philadelphia was said to have outperformed its plan on 3.8% NPW growth on 9% rate gain. But nat cat losses more than tripled and reinsurance costs surged to render a 43% decline in underwriting profits.

Tokio Marine HCC saw profits slide by a milder 22%, but with a similar near tripling of nat cat losses, all in as measured in original FX.

Only the cat-free Delphi excelled amongst US units with underwriting profits nearly doubling on a 7.8% gain in NPW against flat claims.

For all three North American gains, massive jumps in investment income pushed the units to the overall profit gain for the foreign non-life units.

Above expectation nat cat loss, both internationally and at home in Japan, led the group to cut its expectations for profits in its full year ending March 2024.

The group trimmed its FY profit target by JPY 15 bn to JPY 655 bn due to the impact of Nat Cats and losses in North America, despite increasingly favourable FX translations. Management said those losses and other one-off hits would be “mostly offset by robust performance” from key overseas entities and asset sales.

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