On Tuesday, WR Berkley (NYSE:WRB) discussed first-quarter financial results during its earnings call. The full transcript is provided below.
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Summary
WR Berkley reported record net investment income and strong underwriting profits, contributing to a return on beginning equity of 21.2% for Q1 2026.
Net income was $515 million, or $1.31 per share, with a calendar year combined ratio of 90.7%.
The company is seeing increasing competition, particularly in the reinsurance and property markets, but remains focused on cycle management to navigate these challenges.
Growth in gross premiums written was 4.5% in the insurance segment, while net investment income increased by 12.2% to a record $404 million.
Management expressed a cautious yet optimistic outlook, indicating potential for growth in certain niche areas while maintaining disciplined underwriting practices.
The company repurchased 4.5 million shares for $302 million and paid $34 million in dividends, highlighting strong capital management.
WR Berkley is managing its investment portfolio with a focus on high credit quality and a potential for improved yields, given current market conditions.
The company is selectively expanding in areas with attractive margins, particularly in certain casualty lines, while being cautious in more competitive markets.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
Star one to raise your hand to withdraw your question, please press Star one again. The Speaker's remarks may contain forward looking statements. Some of the forward looking statements can be identified by the use of forward looking words including without limitation, believes, expects or estimates. We caution you that such forward looking statements should not be regarded as a representation by us and that the future plans, estimates or expectations contemplated by us will in fact be achieved. Please refer to our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025 and our other filings made with the SEC for a description of the business environment in which we operate and the important factors that may materially affect our results. WR Berkley Corporation is not under any obligation and expressly disclaims any such obligation to update or alter its forward looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Rob Berkeley. Please go ahead sir.
Rob Berkeley
Alexandra thank you very much and good afternoon to all. Thank you for finding time in your calendars to join us. My colleagues and I, we appreciate your interest in the company. So speaking of colleagues joining me on this end of the phone, we also have Executive Chairman Bill Berkley as well as Group Chief Financial Officer Rich Baio. We're going to follow a similar path to what we have used in the past, where I'm going to offer a few more quick comments. Then Rich is going to provide us a summary on the quarter. I will follow behind with a few additional thoughts and then we will be very pleased to take your questions and the conversation in any direction you wish to take it. Before I do hand it over to Rich, just a couple of observations from me, perhaps a bit stating the obvious one is, let there be no confusion, this continues to be very much a cyclical industry. As we've discussed in the past, the cycle is driven by two human emotions, greed and fear. And without a doubt these days it would seem as though the fear is fading and the greed is fully percolating in many of the corners of the marketplace today. One of the things that we've talked about in the past couple of quarters is where is some of this competition coming from or much of this competition coming from? We've talked about MGAs and MGUs delegated authority, a lot of that capacity coming from a variety of different sources, in particular the reinsurance market as well as we talked about Lloyd's as a marketplace providing a lot of capacity to delegated authority. One of the things that we've taken note of over the past 90 days or so is a notable shift in the appetite of the standard market. In particular national carriers who seem to be broadening their appetite and having reached a new level of, I would suggest, competitive nature that we haven't seen in some number of years, though it tends to be focused in certain pockets A couple other comments on the marketplace couple other comments on the marketplace Focusing on the reinsurance market for a moment, I think no surprise property and property CAT within the reinsurance space it has been more and more competitive. We're not surprised with it directionally, but we have been taken aback a bit by the pace of change and how that level of competition has really taken hold at an accelerating pace. In addition to that, the casualty market or the liability market within the reinsurance space never seemed to have gotten much of the bounce that we saw in the property market. Nevertheless, it remains very competitive and we remain concerned for the health and well being of that marketplace over time as there is more competition in the property market that will undoubtedly, at least history would suggest, create more irrational behavior that will be plentiful in both the property cap market as well as the liability market. Couple of thoughts on the insurance marketplace Speaking of property and how it can turn into a marketplace that quickly erodes, we are definitely seeing that particularly with CAT exposed property. On the insurance side, General Liability and Umbrella I would suggest are areas where rate is still available with good reason. Professional, as we've talked about in the past, continues to be a mixed bag. Directors and Officers (D&O) remains one that we are very focused on and seems to be continuing to flirt with the bottom. On the other hand, Employment Practices Liability Insurance (EPLI) in certain jurisdictions is an area from our perspective to be very cautious. I would call out California, particularly Southern California, as one that we are paying close attention to. Speaking of California as it relates to workers compensation we've talked about in the past and we remain convinced that California this time around is out in front of much of the broader workers comp market and without a doubt all eyes remain on the Workers' Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau (WCIRB) and what is to come in the not too distant future and at the possibility of I guess finishing on a bit of a low note. I guess automobile would continue to be an area of great concern from our perspective. It's unclear to us that the marketplace has really wrapped their head around loss cost trend and what action needs to be taken. The punchline before I hand it over to Rich is that at the intersection of a cyclical industry and a focus on risk adjusted return undoubtedly is a concept that we subscribe to and hopefully others do, known as cycle management. The good news for us as we exercise cycle management. The decoupling of product lines as to where they are in the cycle combined with the breadth of our offering allows us to be more resilient than many of our peers that have a narrow offering. So why don't I pause there? And speaking of resilience, rich, over to you please.
Rich Baio (Group Chief Financial Officer)
Great. Thanks, Rob Good afternoon everyone. First quarter marked an Excellent start to 2026 with record net investment income and strong underwriting profits contributing to a return on beginning of year stockholders equity of 21.2%. Net income for the quarter was $515 million or $1.31 per share, while record operating income was $514 million or $1.30 per share. Other drivers benefiting the quarter compared to the prior year included lower catastrophe losses and an improved effective tax rate, starting with underwriting performance. Current accident year combined ratio excluding cat losses was 88.3% and the calendar year combined ratio was 90.7%. The difference was current accident year cat losses of 2.4 loss ratio points or $76 million, compared with the prior year of $111 million or 3.7 loss ratio points. Unlike last year, which was heavily influenced by California wildfires, in the first quarter this year the industry experienced significant winter storm activity occurring in January and February. The current accident year loss ratio excluding catastrophe losses for 2026 is 59.7% compared with 59.4% for the prior year, which reflects a shift in business mix as we look to maximize profitability. The insurance segment's current accident year loss ratio excluding catastrophe losses increased 10 basis points to 60.9%, while the reinsurance and monoline excess segment increased to 51.1%. The expense ratio of 28.6% is comparable to the recent sequential quarters and reflects a small impact from the decline in net premiums earned from the reinsurance and monoline excess segment. We continue to believe that the 2026 expense ratio will be comfortably below 30%, barring any material changes in the marketplace on top line production. Despite heightened competition in certain pockets of the market, the insurance segment grew gross premiums written by 4.5% to $3.4 billion and net premiums written by 3.2% to $2.8 billion. As you can see from the supplemental information on page 7 of the earnings Release, net premiums written grew in all lines of business apart from workers compensation. The reinsurance and monoline excess segment reported net premiums written of $395 million, reflecting decreases in property and casualty lines of business Net Investment income increased 12.2% to a record $404 million, driven by growth in the core portfolio of 11.8% to $354 million and an increase in investment fund income of 46.3% to $40 million. As a reminder, we report the investment funds under 1/4 lag and an average quarterly range for investment fund income is 10 to 20 million dollars. We expect that strong operating cash flow of 668 million in the current quarter should continue to contribute to the growth in that investment income. The duration of our fixed maturity portfolio, including cash and cash equivalents, increased during the quarter to 3.1 years, which remains below the average life of our insurance reserves. The credit quality of the investment portfolio continues to improve to a very strong AA-. The effective tax rate in the first quarter was lower than our normalized run rate of 23% plus or minus, which is usually attributable to higher taxes on foreign earnings and the ability to utilize such foreign tax credits. In the current quarter we reflected a net non recurring tax benefit, reducing our effective tax rate from 22.8% to 16.3% as reported. We expect the remainder of 2026 will return to our normalized run rate. During the quarter we repurchased approximately 4.5 million shares common shares amounting to $302 million and paid regular dividends of $34 million. Stockholders equity increased to approximately 9¼ billion dollars despite the significant capital management. In summary, another positive quarter with meaningful growth in earnings and 21% plus return on beginning equity. Rob, I'll turn it back to you.
Rob Berkeley
Thank you Rich, A little disappointed that this isn't our new run rate on the tax front. You got a whole quarter to figure that out, so let me just offer a couple of more quick sound bites and then we'll move on to Q and A. First off, you would have taken note on the rate came in reasonably healthy at the 7.2 times compared. Just as another perhaps relevant data point, the renewal retention ratio continues to sit at around 80%. Now that thing fluctuates between 78 and a half and 81 and a half. It doesn't move very much and I look at it as one barometer to really understand whether we are turning the book or not in our efforts to get rates. So that's an encouraging sign from my perspective. The Just another quick sound bite on the topic of rate and we touched on this briefly when we had our fourth quarter call and I think you're going to see it come into more and more focus. We've taken a tremendous amount of rate over not just the past couple of quarters, the past few years. I think there are many pockets of the organization where we're feeling very good with what the margin is and the I suppose the need for rate is perhaps not going to be as strong going forward. So what's the punchline? We are actively rethinking what the balance is between rate versus growth and over the coming quarters you may see us take our foot slightly off the rate pedal and look to push harder on the growth in particular lines where we see the margin is particularly attractive and exposure growth is of more interest to us than rate. Rich talked about the top line overall growth. It was obviously some pretty separate and distinct pieces and it does map back, at least in my mind, to the topic of cycle management. You would have seen we took a pretty firm position which quite frankly given our comments in the Q4 call and earlier last year shouldn't have surprised anyone. We all know what's been going on with the rate. We've been very transparent about our view on the casualty or liability lines and the discipline that we'll be exercising there. And kudos to our colleagues that are actually putting that discipline into practice. The other side of the coin, as Rich pointed out, we are still finding opportunities to grow within the insurance space. Clearly a bit of a mixed bag. I think the note between the gross versus net again highlights hopefully in the eyes of those that are observing that this is probably a moment, generally speaking where it's better to be a buyer of reinsurance than a seller of reinsurance. Hence the delta between the gross and the net. I do think Just a final quick comment on the top line in the insurance space, there is a reasonable chance that we will see a bit more growth as the year unfolds and we are revisiting this notion or balance between growth and rate pivoting over quickly to the loss ratio. I think in a nutshell it's winter storms. We had more exposure to that than some. That having been said, we think it is still a good trade. The comments on the expense ratio. I share very much Richard's view that we'll be keeping it below 30. The movement that you would have seen in the reinsurance and excess segment was primarily a result of a reduction in premium on the reinsurance front. Switching over to the investment portfolio for a moment and you know, Rich flagged for you all the strength of the quality with a very strong double A minus almost Flirting with a double A. But a couple other points that I would flag is that the book yield on the portfolio is about 4.7 percent, new money rate is 5 percent plus. So we still got some room there for improvement. In addition to that, the duration as Rich pointed out is sitting at 3.1 years. As a friendly reminder, the average life of our loss reserves, which is a big part of what we're investing, is a hair inside of four years. So what's the punchline? The punchline is a couple of things. One, the quality is high, there's opportunity with the book yield moving up and we have flexibility around pushing that duration out, which is A plus as well. So even if you discount the growth in the portfolio due to the strength of the cash flow that Rich was referencing, which is there is real and you see it quarter after quarter. But even if you put that aside, there is meaningful upside on the depending on whether you look at the overall including cash 28 billion or if you want to back out the cash 25 and a half billion, there's meaningful upside from there, both because of growth of investable assets as well as the new money rate which again with the duration we have flexibility. On the topic of flexibility and I promise last topic for me at least for the moment is capital. And I know it's not something that we spend a lot of time talking about on these calls, but I did want to draw folks attention to it and that is our financial leverage which is sitting at about 22.6% these days, which is a. I don't know if it's an all time low, but it's an all time low in my some number of decades at the organization. I think it's important to take note of that for a couple of reasons. Number one, when you look at the returns that we're generating, we're generating it with a much higher level of capital or equity for that matter. More specifically in the business. Number two, I would draw your attention to the fact that we as an organization do not have an expectation for 22.6 to keep going down from here. This is a very comfortable place. We think we got lots of room if an opportunity presented itself. So what does that mean? That means if you look at this business that's earning, I don't know, between a billion, 7, 50 and 2 billion and something a year, give or take. And you think about where our leverage ratios are, what that means is we are generating capital significantly more quickly than we can consume it and that we will have significant amounts of capital to return to shareholders for the foreseeable. And to that end, even with us doing that, we still have a tremendous amount of flexibility to take advantage of whatever unforeseen opportunities may be coming our way. So I flag that because what you saw in the quarter with the repurchase, what you've seen us do with special dividends and recognizing the earnings power of the business and how we see the growth opportunities before us that we are going to in all likelihood have large amounts of capital to continue to return to shareholders and what we will believe is the most effective and efficient way that is in the best interest of our shareholders. So I know we talk about repurchase every now and then, people talk about special dividends, but I just wanted to put those data points out there. And again, we can talk more about it during the Q and A if people wish to, but it seemed like that was a relevant topic of the day. So why don't we take a pause there. Alexandra, if we could please open it up for questions.
OPERATOR
We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow up. If you would like to ask a question, please press Star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press Star one again. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q and A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Elise Greenspan with Wells Fargo. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Hi, Elise. Good afternoon.
Elise Greenspan (Equity Analyst)
Hi, thanks. Good evening. My first question, I guess I'm just trying to, Rob, square away your comments, right? You started off by saying, you know, just pointing to, greed and fear in the market. And then you were talking about standard market carriers especially national carriers, right. That brought in appetite and pointing to the market getting more competitive. But then you also ended your comments by saying that there's perhaps some better opportunities to push for a little less price and show better growth. So can you just help me square what felt like introductory comments that.
Rob Berkeley
Thank you for the question, Elise. And what I perhaps was not as clear on as I should have been with my opening comments is that I think there are still pockets where there is good opportunity. I think a lot of those pockets tend to be more casualty related. We as an organization have a bent towards casualty as opposed to shorter tail lines, particularly property where the competition is most pronounced. So do I think overall, the market is a bit more competitive today than it was yesterday? Yes, I do. Do I think there are still pockets of the marketplace that we are a meaningful participant that offer opportunity. Yes, I do.
Elise Greenspan (Equity Analyst)
Okay. And then as we, you know, trying to triangulate that in terms of just thinking about premium growth and I guess my comment is more focused on the insurance segment. Right. It got slightly better, you know, this quarter. But I think from your comments on last quarter's call. Right. I think you had insinuated growth in January might have been within range of seven. Right. So we could see that things, it seems like slowed in February and March. So how are you thinking about just the level of pickup of growth that we could see?
Rob Berkeley
I don't know. You're right, Anthony, there's a lag Sorry to interrupt you, Elise. I beg your pardon. There's a bit of a lag on the line. But I think to answer your question, and maybe we confused the situation if we did, apologies, but we actually saw the top line improve as we made our way through the quarter as opposed to the other way around. So January was not our. Did not prove to be our best month.
Elise Greenspan (Equity Analyst)
Okay. But then, so for your comments about growth getting better, I guess my last question Is that a Q2 comment? Is that more maybe Q3, Q4, just based on how you today
Rob Berkeley
we are hopeful that we will be able to do better in Q2, but you know, I can't promise that right now. What I can tell you is that we as an organization oftentimes are quoting 90 days out, sometimes 60 days out, sometimes even longer than 90 days out. So the as we identify pockets where we are willing to make a trade as far as maybe a bit less rate in order for a bit more growth, it takes a little bit of time for that to come into focus. How that will play out, I can't promise that. I know what I talk to my colleagues about and I hear from them how they're thinking about things. And that's what I'm trying to share with you. So I can't promise that in Q2 we will grow X amount more. We'll have to see how it unfolds. But I am trying to give you a little bit of a flavor as to what the dialogue is within our clubhouse. Thank you.
OPERATOR
Yep. Your next question comes from the line of Rob Cox with Goldman Sachs. Rob, your line is now open. Please go ahead. Hi, Rob.
Rob Cox (Equity Analyst)
Good evening. Good evening. Yeah, just first question on property. You know, I hear your comments this quarter and in recent quarters that, you know, property dynamics are repeating themselves. I'm curious where you think property is from a price adequacy perspective, whether it's ROE or whatever metric and how you would bifurcate across insurance, reinsurance and maybe by geography.
Rob Berkeley
So I think that's a pretty big question from my perspective. I think that there's still margin in a lot of places, but it's falling off pretty quickly. I think it's fallen off most quickly in the reinsurance marketplace. I think then it would waterfall down into cat exposed or ENS property. And probably the place where there's been the least level of sea change would be the admitted or standard property risk property market overall, that having been said, that part of the market probably got the least bounce. But in my mind, the reinsurance market led the way up and the reinsurance market is leading the way down.
Rob Cox (Equity Analyst)
Okay, that's helpful. And I just had a follow up. You know, professional lines, you mentioned pricing, trying to bottom there looked like your strongest growth at berkeley since the first quarter of 2022 in professional lines this quarter. You know, I don't think a lot of that was pricing. It seems like exposure grew, you know, do you anticipate seeing further opportunities in professional lines? And is there any other color you could provide on the quarter?
Rob Berkeley
Sure. So I think professional is a pretty broad category. I tried to fashion my comments around two areas that gave us reason for pause. Dno, particularly public dno, and certain components of the EPLI market. That having been said, a lot of the growth that you saw on the professional front, much of it came from outside of the United States. My earlier comments were really focused on the US market. So that's really what I can offer on that. As far as the places specifically where we think that it's the best opportunity, that's just not something we're going to unpack publicly.
Rob Cox (Equity Analyst)
Thanks, Rob.
Rob Berkeley
Yep, thank you.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Alex Scott with Barclays. Alex, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Alex Scott
Hi. Thanks for taking the question. First one is on reinsurance. I know you mentioned, you know, better to be a buyer than a seller at the moment. So I just wanted to, you know, take your temperature on what to expect there for the full year. And, you know, when we look at the growth numbers for this quarter, is there anything funky in there around like restatement, probably premiums or anything like that that we should consider? I just want to make sure I understand the right kind of run rate for that business.
Rob Berkeley
Nothing funky, to use your words, in the reinsurance numbers. And I think it's just a reflection of market conditions from our perspective. And you're seeing a combination certainly of a more Competitive market. And simultaneously you're seeing a couple of signs of Cedar's struggling to get their top line where they want it. So they're increasing their net and that may feel good in the short run. We'll see how it works out in the long run.
Alex Scott
Makes sense. Okay. I wanted to come back to Casualty reserves a little bit. I know this is sort of bold news because you guys put out the triangles and so forth with the 4k results. Sorry, the 4k results. But would be interested if you have any comments you'd share on the other liability and just what we see in there related to some of the early years. There's releasing on shorter tail casualty versus some building of reserves and longer tail. I mean, what would you say to us to help us kind of wrap our arms around that and get more comfortable with the trends we see?
Rob Berkeley
You know, as far as that goes, I think that's probably a bigger conversation than probably makes sense. To hold up everyone's time on it, we have put a fair amount of information out and supplements out. In addition to that, I think some of our folks, in an effort to help piece it all together, have reached out to yourself and to others. And if you'd like to further the conversation, we're happy to help you piece together the public information. Obviously there's a bit of a constraint as to how far we can go, but we'd be very happy to pick that up with the Alex offline. But I think that's a. That's not going to be a quick answer.
Alex Scott
Yeah, I understood. Yeah, there. Okay, thank you. I do appreciate the extra disclosures.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Andrew Kligerman with TD Cohen. Andrew, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Rob Berkeley
Hey, thanks a lot. Good afternoon. Good afternoon.
Andrew Kligerman (Equity Analyst)
The first question. Yeah, the first question is around the capital management. Rob, I'm trying to frame your appetite in terms of what's bigger. Is it the buyback, the one time big dividend, special dividend, or is it growth in a challenged market? Because as I look at what you did in the first quarter, 302 million, that's a lot of buyback. As much as you did in all of 2024 when the stock price was about 20% lower and the earnings were very similar to what we're seeing today, you know, so. Yeah. Or do you do a big dividend like you did in 24 or 25 and then where should that leverage ratio be? You said 22.6 is too low. Where would you like it to level out? So sorry for the long wind on this one, but why the big buyback in the quarter and what's the appetite? Buyback versus dividend and where will the leverage be? So a lot to unpack. Great.
Rob Berkeley
Well, thank you for the question, Andrew. I guess a couple of things there. First off, as far as the 22, 6, I did not suggest or and if I misspoke, shame on me. But I didn't suggest that we wanted to go lower or higher. I think what I tried to suggest to you is that we didn't see it going much lower than that. I'm not suggesting that we want it to go considerably higher. It really depends on the circumstances at any moment in time and how we're positioning the business for what we see today and what we envision for tomorrow. Number two, the point that I was trying to articulate earlier is that the opportunity for growth for the organization today and what we see in all likelihood tomorrow is we think we'll be able to grow, but it's not going to be the growth rate that we enjoyed some number of years in the past or for some number of years. So that's just a reality of market conditions. So again, will there be growth? Yes. Is there going to be the kind of growth we saw in the past? Probably not. So with that all having been said, the reality is with the company generating, you know, call it 20 plus percent returns, or said differently, call it, you know, flirting with $2 billion of net income, you know, that is a lot of capital that we need to figure out if we don't need it, how we're going to return it to our shareholders. And that's just the reality as far as what levers we utilize to return capital to shareholders. That's something that we grapple with every day and we think about what is in the best interest of all shareholders as far as whether it's special dividend, whether it's repurchase, whatever it may be. As far as what we did in the past and when we back, you know, I'm not we can take it offline and try and unpack what we did this quarter versus that quarter. A lot of it has to do with valuation at the moment in time. A lot of it has to do with how we see growth opportunity. So there's a lot of things that we consider if you're looking for more guidance as to what we're specifically going to do to be returning this surplus of significant surplus of capital that we're generating at this today and expect to be generating Tomorrow. I don't have a particular roadmap to share with you, but it's certainly something that we will continue to be transparent about on a quarterly basis.
Andrew Kligerman (Equity Analyst)
Okay, thank you for that, Rob. And with regard to the gross versus net written premium, the net being 3.2 against the gross at four and a half, any read through there with the lower net, any color that you can share on why that net was materially lower.
Rob Berkeley
It's a combination of mix of business. And in addition to that, as we tried to flag earlier, there were opportunities to buy some reinsurance of what we believe to be attractive terms.
Andrew Kligerman (Equity Analyst)
Got it. And just sneak one last one prior year development. Anything unusual in the casualty lines, plus
Rob Berkeley
or minus, Nothing particularly exciting. If you want to do a deeper dive, at least to, to the extent we're able, we'll share with you whatever we're allowed to share with you on that. And obviously there'll be more detail available in the queue. Much appreciated. Thanks for the call.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Michael Zaremski with BMO Capital Markets. Michael, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Michael Zaremski (Equity Analyst)
Hey, thanks. First question kind of pivoting back to social inflationary lines. Rob, you know we, you know, loud and clear, we, you know, we heard your comment. I think most would agree with you that you know, the industries still getting their hands around loss cost trend industry is doing very well though overall. Would you be willing to kind of paint a broad brush on kind of how Berkeley views loss trend in GL umbrella commercial auto. Because you know, like back to Alex Scott's questions, you know we, we all do see, you know, Berkeley like peers, you know, adding truing up your loss picks a bit higher as well. So, so curious if you could add any color there.
Rob Berkeley
If you, if you're asking me to share with you what our trend assumptions are by product line, that that's not something that we put out, generally speaking for public consumption as it relates to our loss picks. We are constantly looking at our data and what is it telling us we're constantly looking at industry data and we're looking at other data sets as well, both traditional and non traditional and trying to respond to that. We put it all into our sausage maker and then a lot of folks sit around and try and apply our judgment to the best of our ability. So I'm not sure what more I can add, Mike, at this stage other than, you know, we are very focused on making sure that our picks are appropriate and based on what we conclude on that front, we are looking to Actively respond from a rate perspective, terms conditions and I think one of the points I should have made earlier that we tend to not always focus on as much as we could or should is the role that jurisdiction or territory plays as a component of selection. So anyways, I suspect there's not a satisfactory answer amongst my commentary to you. But the long and the short of it is we just don't get into that level of detail by product line what our view around trend is. But I can assure you we are very focused on it and we are responding in what we believe is a timely manner not just for the picks but the action that that would suggest we should be taking from a selection and pricing perspective.
Michael Zaremski (Equity Analyst)
Got it. That's fair. Yeah. I just thought worth asking some, some of your peers have, you know, reluctantly, I guess disclosed some, some broad brush trends. I'm just kind of pivoting, you know, back to the debt to cap discussion and maybe I'll try another way. You gave the context earlier. But you know, we can see as you kind of alluded to, you know, your very long term average debt to cap oscillates low 20s, mid 30s, but it's averaged, you know, 30 plus. So can you maybe remind us as there are other like circumstances when you, when, when you are increasing your leverage, is it when you feel there's, you're very bullish about the marketplace or any, any additional context you think worth ask mentioning. Thanks.
Rob Berkeley
The answer is that when we see opportunity in the market, we are very happy to in the short run flex that leverage up. But you know, quite frankly we are very comfortable where we are today, but we certainly have the ability to flex it up if the opportunity presented itself. Thanks.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Bob Huang with Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Bob Huang (Equity Analyst)
Hi, good evening. Good evening. Good evening. So my first question is also on the capital side in a different way. Right. I think you talked about willingness to grow your business. You clearly have at capital. Is there some way to think about the balance between growing inorganically versus buyback and dividends?
Rob Berkeley
Are there lines of business that you feel, Bob, to make sure I'm following when you say inorganically as opposed to organically, are you talking about like M and A? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yeah. So like if we think like it does MA make sense for you guys? Are there lines where you think M and A makes sense? It's certainly some. Most things that investment bankers are out trying to sell, we get a phone call on most of the time when you hear about a transaction. We're already somewhat aware of it because we got the phone call. But. And as we've shared with some, we tend to err on the side of being cautious and cheap. And we recognize that most MA transactions in this industry, not all, but most, if folks could do it all over again, at least the buyers, they probably wouldn't. So I would never say never. We certainly look at things from time to time, but we are very comfortable with the organic growth model. We are pretty disciplined in how we operate the business, and we are willing to be patient because of this philosophy around risk and return. But again, you never know what tomorrow will bring. But there's a reason why we have not been historically active on that front. Really appreciate that. Thank you.
Bob Huang (Equity Analyst)
My second question is on the growth side of things. Right. And this is some things that's been asked somewhat. I'm just curious. In the beginning of the call, you kind of talked about the market is in a greedy environment, so to speak. Right. And as you think about pivoting to growth, are there areas where you feel the market maybe is too greedy and then you just kind of have to avoid. Are there areas where you think maybe the market is too cautious and it represents a very big opportunity for you or a semi big opportunity for it?
Rob Berkeley
Just maybe, if you can give us a little bit more of a breakdown there. So the answer is, and again, maybe I created more confusion than clarity with my opening comments and apologies for that. There is no doubt that if we want to use a broad brush, the market is overall more competitive today than it was a year ago, let alone two years ago or three years ago. That having been said, there are still pockets, particularly within certain aspects of the liability space that offer some, what we believe is attractive opportunities. As far as available margins, it is not as broadly available as it once was, but it is still there. The shorter tail lines, not all, but much of them, have become notably more competitive, and certain aspects of the liability lines have become more competitive. But because of the breadth of our offering, we are still able to find opportunities where we still think that there are attractive margins that are available and attractive enough to the point that we are willing to take our foot off of the rate pedal a little bit, which is why I'm suggesting, as our colleagues are contemplating that and pivoting their behavior, there is a likelihood that you will see some level of growth that is coming from these niche opportunities. And we saw our colleagues pivoting more and more throughout the quarter, which is why I was suggesting to, I believe it was, Elise, earlier that January, the growth was less relative to March, and that was primarily a result of our colleagues pivoting, reminding you and others that we are oftentimes quoting 90 days out in advance. So it takes time for that pivot to convert into binders or written premium. What does that mean for Q2? Honestly, I can't promise anything. I can only share with you what the narrative is that's going on within our organization and how we are seeing the marketplace and how we are adjusting our approach. Okay. Really appreciate that. Thank you for clarification. Okay, sorry for any confusion.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Tracy Bengigi with Wolf Research. Tracey, your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Tracy Bengigi (Equity Analyst)
Hey, Tracy. Good evening. Hey, good evening. Since casualty reinsurance never got the same bounce as you saw on property, I'm curious, is this business rate adequate now or is it approaching rate inadequacy?
Rob Berkeley
So I think you would have heard for some number of quarters or beyond us bitching and moaning about the casualty reinsurance marketplace and how we didn't think seating commissions made sense. And that's a pretty broad brush that I'm using there. So if we're writing the business, we believe that it's an acceptable margin. But as you would have seen, you know, our casualty portfolio within reinsurance was down considerably in the quarter. And that is not just because. Not because we're charging less for the same exposure. It's because that book of business is shrinking. I can't speak to the broader market. I can only talk to what our colleagues are doing, as I understand it.
Tracy Bengigi (Equity Analyst)
Understood. Also, you mentioned potential upside from net investment income. And you also noted certain insurance pockets like casualty, you might prioritize growth over rate. So are you taking more of a total return approach when setting combined targets for your underwriters? Maybe putting more weight on net investment income, which will allow you to grow?
Rob Berkeley
The answer is no. We have a view on loss ratios. And, you know, to take your comment to an extreme, we as an organization have never subscribed to the notion of cash flow underwriting or anything akin to that. Are we conscious of what the contribution is from the investment portfolio? Of course we are. We are acutely aware of that. But we are not willing to throw the underwriting discipline out the window because of where interest rates are today. We look to each component of our economic model to stand on its own two feet and justify the capital that it utilizes. Thank you. Thank you.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Mark Hughes with Truist Securities. Mark, your Line is now open. Please go ahead.
Mark Hughes (Equity Analyst)
Yeah, thank you. Good afternoon. Rob, you mentioned that. Yeah. You mentioned that the large standard carriers are ramping up their appetite.
Rob Berkeley
You saw a step up in competition. Is that largely on the casualty side you're referring to? Is that influencing the balance in the ENS and standard markets? A little more on that would be interesting. They are active on the property side and to the extent that it's on the casualty side, ironically it's been in pockets of the casualty market that are okay but not great. So it's really bizarre. They're not going after the good stuff, they're going after the marginal stuff and in some cases, I mean they're taking it for 30% off, which is bizarre because they could have had it for 10% off. So you know, as we say around here and certainly my boss over here has reminded us even long tail business, you write a cheap enough so you know they'll keep. They can keep going with 30 off and we'll look forward to seeing it back in a couple of years.
Mark Hughes (Equity Analyst)
Yeah, very good. And then to the extent that you're successful in pivoting to growth here in the second quarter, does that have a meaning for your loss picks? Could we potentially see loss picks a little higher?
Rob Berkeley
Sorry, Mark, you broke up a little. Can you please repeat that? Yeah. The question was if you do.
Mark Hughes (Equity Analyst)
Rob, can you hear me now? Yes, thank you. Okay, well, very good. The if you're successful in generating some better growth in the second quarter, does
Rob Berkeley
that have a meaning for loss pick? Could you possibly see loss picks go a little bit higher if you're not pushing as much on rate? I don't think that would be something that I would leap to in my view. I think what we're really saying is that there are pockets of the business where we've been very, very focused on rate and we think we have room and maybe it'll be proved to be that the picks were had more room in them than we had originally anticipated. But we'll have to see with time. Very good. I don't think you're going to. Thank you.
OPERATOR
Your next call comes from the line of David Motimaden with Evercore isi. Your line is now open. Please click go ahead.
David Motimaden (Equity Analyst)
Hey, thanks. Good evening. You had mentioned just. Hey, hey, Rob, can you guys hear me? Yes, thank you. Great. So just, just back on the topic of just maybe letting up a little bit on the rate increases in some lines and you know I may have missed this so I apologize in advance but is there any like broad class of business that you had referred to is that short tail, is it casualty, is it professional lines? I'm not looking for like specific sub lines within those, but was hoping you could elaborate on like, you know, a little bit, just which, you know, broad area. You think that you guys might have opportunities to let up on price and maybe we can see growth accelerate.
Rob Berkeley
Yeah, we just haven't put that detail out there. We'll think about if there's something we can tuck into the queue that could be helpful along those lines. But at this stage we just haven't put anything out there yet. Thank you.
David Motimaden (Equity Analyst)
Got it, thanks. And then the growth in the insurance business in the short tail lines continues to tick along at 5%. You know, I was a little surprised at that just given the pricing pressure on the commercial property side. So it's hoping maybe you could unpack that a little bit more for us and just, you know, how we should think about the durability of the growth there.
Rob Berkeley
I think that you're focusing on it through the lens of commercial and I would encourage you to broaden your lens to incorporate our A and H business that we've spoken of in the past as well as our private client business.
David Motimaden (Equity Analyst)
Got it, thanks. And then maybe just one more, you know, maybe just a high level question. I think you talked about the average life of your reserves at about four years. I was a little surprised. That hasn't really changed that much. I think it's been there around like the last, the last few years. But I guess I was wondering, it does feel like claims durations are extending. So I was hoping maybe just philosophically just taking a step back, you know what you guys are seeing. Do you think we're seeing more stability here in claims payment patterns as we think about looking through the reserves?
Rob Berkeley
I think that at this stage we feel pretty comfortable that maybe just take half a step back. David. I think that we all know that the industry got caught a bit flat footed with inflation, particularly social inflation. And it's been a bit of a process of catch up. I think that picture, as we've all discussed ad nauseam, was clouded by Covid for us to a great extent. And I think at this stage the industry and ourselves included have adopted and adapted to the new reality of the claims environment and what we see coming out of the legal environment. Got it. Understood. That's helpful. Appreciate it.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Joshua Shanker with Bank of America. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Joshua Shanker (Equity Analyst)
Josh, good evening. Thank you for taking My question and how y' all doing? Good. Thanks Josh. Hope you're well too. Thank you. Thank you so much. I guess I want to talk about your go to market strategy or maybe opposite go away from market strategy. As I see the declines in the reinsurance book, I'm trying to understand the complexion of your book. Sometimes people participate on syndicates, sometimes you have some unique one off deals. I know your program business is in the program management business in that reinsurance bucket and that's probably seeing some competition from MGA's. Can you talk about as the business is leaving, are you walking away? Is it being competed away? What's the process and what exactly are
Rob Berkeley
you losing A lot of the lion's share. What we're losing would be treaty reinsurance business and it's due to how we think about appropriate pricing and it would seem as though go ahead in your application on that or are those are one off deals that you that you're managing? No, they tend to be a subscription market if you like, or a treaty that has multiple participants and so just someone else is coming with the capital. You know you're walking away and there's plenty of someone else coming in with the capital. Or the cedent is looking for better terms than we're prepared to offer and maybe they they choose to keep it. Certainly a trend that we're starting to see more of is seeded in some cases. If they can't get far better terms are looking to keep it as a way to bolster their own top line and then switching to, you know, competition from MGAs. Right now it's at the top. Something talking about past calls. I mean the insurance growth looks fairly healthy. Are you seeing less competition in the past or as heady as ever? No, we are not seeing the delegated authority model, MGAMG, etc. We're not seeing that subside in any way at this time. And then one last one. You know, as you're thinking about deployment of capital, obviously returning capital is a big deal, but you've liked yields in the market. Is there anything attractive in the alternative spaces compared to past quarters where you might be deploying money into more illiquid products? We certainly have a participation in the alternative space. I would add that we do not have a participation in the private credit space just to make sure. There's no question about that. But right now, given what the public fixed income market is offering as far as yield, we don't feel much need to look beyond that. Okay, those are great answers. Thank you for fitting Me in. Sure. Thank you. Have a good evening.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Katie Sakis with Autonomous Research. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Katie Sakis (Equity Analyst)
Good evening, Rob. Really quickly, how would you describe your approach to managing commercial auto exposures today versus your comments last quarter on shrinking exposures? I think with your very frank description of the auto liability market today, I'm just kind of curious as to what's giving your confidence in the growth that you're still showing in that book, that it's not resulting in adverse selection.
Rob Berkeley
Well, just to be clear, the growth that we are experiencing is premium, not unit growth or exposure growth. So the rate that we are taking far exceeds the growth rate. So the exposure is shrinking and the rate is increasing. So the growth that you saw on page, whatever it is of the release, It's all. It's all right then. And then some.
Katie Sakis (Equity Analyst)
Yep, makes sense. And then, any new news on Berkeley Embedded? I realize it's only been a couple of months and I might be ahead of my skis here, but are there any product lines that have gone live with that? And if so, how are you guys thinking about channel conflict with your traditional distribution partners there?
Rob Berkeley
So as far as Berkeley Embedded, they're off to a great start. And they do have one product offering that is chugging along in consumer space. And as it relates to channel conflict right now, the type of business that we are entertaining through that avenue is really not something that we would be accessing in any other way. That having been said there, there is a reality as we've talked about in the past. You know, once upon a time, there was a defined swim lane for carriers and there was a defined swim lane for distribution. And I think what we're seeing more and more of is those lines are getting somewhat blurred. And while we are very committed to our traditional distribution, ultimately in the end our focus also has to be on the insured. And we need to be willing to meet insureds where they wish to be met. Got it. Thank you. Thanks for the question. Have a good evening.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Andrew Anderson with Jefferies. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Andrew Anderson (Equity Analyst)
Hi, Andrew, Good evening. Hey, thanks. Just go. Good evening. Just on workers comp growth has been a little bit lighter there the last couple quarters. To what extent is there an opportunity for that to pick up again? Or is there maybe a binding constraint here you're thinking about with regards to price or medical trend uncertainty? Yeah, we're just, you know, I can't tell you exactly what the Next quarter will be. But generally speaking, directionally we have had somewhat of a defensive posture with much, not all, but much of the comp market that we participate in. And we're looking forward to that market experiencing some type of firming at some point. And when it does, I think you will see us expand and hopefully the opportunity will be there for us to expand dramatically. Got it. And I know we've touched on this
Rob Berkeley
a bit, but just kind of high level here. When you're talking about the standard or national carriers taking back some business, would you describe this as more of a normal ebb and flow or are the standard national carriers maybe going deeper into ENS and more into lines of business that have been stickier in the ENS channel?
Andrew Anderson (Equity Analyst)
Historian I don't think that they are going to derail the ENS marketplace, certainly not today and likely not tomorrow. But you know, we certainly do see them more present in the market with an appetite that is seemingly a bit broader today than it was yesterday. And at times it would appear as though they are misclassifying risks. I don't know how else you could get to some of the rates that they are entertaining. And we'll have to see how it unfolds. I think it's again more pronounced in some of the shorter tail lines it exists, but less visible in some of the liability lines. Thank you.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Mayor Shields with Keith Briet and Woods. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Shields
Great. Thanks so much. I appreciate your taking my call. First question, I guess, Rob, last quarter
Rob Berkeley
and this quarter you talked a little bit about taking the collective foot off the gas in terms of pricing in some lines. Should we think of that as a top down directive or is that bubbling up from the various underwriters?
Shields
Look, we just to be clear, are not a top down organization in that sense. We certainly pay attention, we ask lots of questions we want to understand. But we are not top down directing our colleagues throughout the operations as to what they should or shouldn't charge. We look at the data and grapple with them. But again, this is an organization where those types of decisions are driven by our colleagues that run the various businesses. And you know, that's just part of our philosophy that having been said, we do use group data that gets aggregated in other data sources to bring it to bear and put it in the hands of our colleagues running the businesses so they have as good an information set as possible to make their decisions.
Rob Berkeley
Okay, that's very helpful. And then very briefly, whether It's Lloyd's or reinsurance businesses. Does Berkeley have any exposure to the Middle east conflict? Nothing of consequence. Okay, thank you so much. We're just not a big player in the war space. We're a very modest player in certain aspects of the Marine market and we are very active users of war exclusions. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Thank you. Good night, Alexandra. Anything else?
OPERATOR
There is one final question. This comes from comes to the line of Brian Meredith with ubs. Your line is now open. Brian, please go ahead.
Brian Meredith (Equity Analyst)
Thanks, Rob. I'll keep it Just one question here. I'm just curious in your growth thoughts for the year here, is any of that related to perhaps your incubator type businesses transitioning into segments? And I'm thinking something like the Berkeley Edge. And maybe you can talk a little bit about Berkeley Edge and how's that doing so far?
Rob Berkeley
So I think that some of the new ventures are off to a good start, but relative to the overall size of the group, while we look forward to their meaningful contributions, it's not likely in the short run that they are going to get enough traction to move the needle for the group on their own. I think the opportunity is certainly going to come from their contributions, but will come from many others throughout the organization. As far as Berkeley Edge, they are up, they are running and they are off to a good start. But just to level set expectations, it was a standing start that they begun from. But we're very pleased with the progress that they're making and we think it's an outstanding group of people that are going to bring value to distribution, customers and certainly to capital. Terrific. Thank you, Rob. Thank you.
OPERATOR
There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Mr. Rob Berkeley for closing remarks.
Rob Berkeley
Alexandra, thank you very much for your assistance this evening. Thank you to all who tuned in for again your interest in the company and the questions as I hope people would have gathered by any measure a very solid quarter and perhaps equally, if not more exciting, how well positioned the business is to continue to grow, prosper and generate value for stakeholders. We look forward to speaking with you over the summer. Thank you very much. Have a good evening.
Disclaimer: This transcript is provided for informational purposes only. While we strive for accuracy, there may be errors or omissions in this automated transcription. For official company statements and financial information, please refer to the company's SEC filings and official press releases. Corporate participants' and analysts' statements reflect their views as of the date of this call and are subject to change without notice.
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