Hints and tips:
...Having outperformed other financials last year, the S&P Property & Casualty Insurance index is down 7 per cent so far this year. That compares with the S&P 500’s 15 per cent gain....
...Mayhem persists among the US’s property and casualty insurers. Auto-insurance businesses are still losing money....
...No premiums for insurtech Once high-flying insurance start-ups like Lemonade, Hippo and Root have emerged as the biggest casualties of the broader sell off in tech stocks, the FT’s Ian Smith writes....
...So far though, most of the action has been in property and casualty insurance — cover for buildings, cars and business....
...Exane likes Sampo and Lancashire as the most defensive of the property and casualty insurers....
...Apollo has a record in the property & casualty insurance industry....
...The proceeds of Thursday’s IPO all go to the parent Axa as it looks to fund its $15bn buyout of property and casualty insurer XL Group. Axa has other priorities than its US businesses....
...The disposal leaves The Hartford, whose history stretches back to 1810, focused on property casualty insurance and employee benefits....
...Proceeds will be used to help fund the $15.3bn purchase of Bermuda-based insurer XL Group, which will expand Axa’s position in US property and casualty insurance and specialist parts of commercial insurance...
...Ex-Barclays chief Bob Diamond’s private equity group has signed its biggest ever deal, buying a $100bn book of US life insurance business....
...Shares of Travelers, one of the largest US property and casualty insurance companies, weighed on the broader Dow Jones Industrial Average with a drop of 3 per cent at the start of trading on Monday, after...
...Earnings from finance and insurance fell by $234m, and from company management positions by $630m — more than in any other US state....
...The insurer, which is more than 200 years old, has overhauled its operations in recent years to focus on property-casualty cover, as well as group benefits and mutual funds....
...The results from the Hartford, which sells mutual funds as well as property and casualty insurance and group benefit policies, are the latest sign of a squeeze on the industry’s profits....
...But switching to a new auditor may not quell doubts about the reliability of the company’s earnings report....
...Hartford Financial, a smaller rival, jumped more than 6 per cent to a fresh seven-year high of $44.19 and Travelers Companies rose 2.73 per cent to $99.30....
...Tony Kuczinksi, chief executive of Munich Re America, said that although climate change presented complex risks for the property and casualty insurance sector, it also posed a number of business opportunities...
...Mr Hancock, chief executive of AIG’s property and casualty division, beat Jay Wintrob, who heads AIG’s life insurance division, to the top job after a lengthy consideration of both executives by the board...
...The fund, which will make extensive use of exchange traded derivatives and currency hedging, is “unashamedly” aimed at property and casualty insurers with a two- to three-year liability structure....
...AIG pointed to improved underwriting in its property casualty division and, in the life insurance division, “robust” sales of variable annuities and retail mutual funds and higher net investment income....
...Hartford has been looking to sell Woodbury since it bowed to shareholder pressure in March to focus on its property and casualty business....
...He has argued that too few analysts and investors understand complex insurance businesses and as a result have not seen the full value of Hartford’s “best in class” property and casualty unit....
...At the same time, it has participated in an industry-wide increase in pricing in its separate property and casualty business to make up for disaster-related losses last year....
...Now, I would say that Hartford needs to do something drastic because the stock is the lowest valuation relative to book value of any major insurance company....
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