Beazley reports rise in gross written premiums
Beazley, the parent company of specialist insurance businesses with operations in Europe, the US, Asia, and the Middle East, has reported a rise in gross premiums written for the nine months ended 30 September 2019. Key drivers include its new specialty lines division, which saw premium growth of 24 percent to $662m, and its newly created cyber and executive risk division, which achieved premium growth of 16 percent.
Total gross written premiums increased by 12 percent to $2.2bn (Q3 2018: $1.9bn), while premium rates on renewal business increased by 6 percent. The company reported a strong investment return of $215m (Q3 2018: $26m).
Andrew Horton, chief executive officer, said: “We continue to see strong, double digit premium growth across our business as a whole, driven by organic growth and rate rises across many lines of business.
“We have continued to experience heightened claims activity with our exposure to catastrophes in Q3 estimated to be $80m net of reinsurance and reinstatement premium.
“We have been anticipating a more difficult claims environment in areas such as directors and officers, employment practice liability and healthcare liability in recent years. As such we have been adjusting our underwriting for several years in these areas and began opening at a higher reserve position at the start of 2018.
“Our investment team has delivered another strong performance in Q3, bringing our year to date net investment income to $215m or 4.0 percent.”
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