Chubb's Q1 profits soar as market responds “rationally” to years of underpricing

Chubb has reported strong first quarter profit growth, as the carrier took advantage of the hardening market that its chief executive stressed was a rational response to years of industry underpricing.

Chubb reported net profit of $2.3 billion for Q1 2021, compared with $252 million in the same period the previous year.

Net written premiums in its property and casualty (P&C) segment totalled $8.04 billion, up 9.7 percent on the $7.33 billion reported in Q1 2020. Its combined ratio, meanwhile, increased slightly to 91.8 percent, from 89.1 percent the previous year.

Its pre-tax P&C catastrophe losses, net of reinsurance and including reinstatement premiums, were $700 million, compared with $237 million in Q1 2020.

Evan Greenberg, Chubb’s chairman and chief executive officer, expressed satisfaction at a “very good quarter with excellent commercial premium revenue growth globally, double-digit renewal rate change in our commercial P&C businesses, and further expansion of our underwriting margins.”

He said the commercial P&C businesses globally had capitalised on favorable underwriting conditions. “From what we can see, I am confident these market conditions will endure,” he said, adding they represented “a rational response to the loss environment and years of industry underpricing.”