Conduit Holdings Limited

Good day, everyone, and welcome to Conduit's Q1 2026 Trading Update. Thank you for joining us today. Joining me on the call are Neil Eckert, Chief Executive Officer, Elaine Whelan, Chief Financial Officer, and Stephen Possilwhite, Chief Underwriting Officer. Please note our disclaimer language on slide two. I will now turn the call over to our CEO, Neil Eckert.

Thanks, Brett, and welcome, everyone. As mentioned on our 2025 results call, Stephen joined in January, and I'm delighted to have him with us today. As usual, today's update focuses on our top-line underwriting experience during the quarter and our view of the market, with Steve providing more details of each of our segments. Elaine will then cover the financial and investment highlights, including a review of our capital management strategy. In the first quarter of 2026, we continued to identify select areas for growth and increased growth premiums written by 4.9% over the prior year. Growth was again led by our casualty segment where risk adjusted pricing has remained stable. The quarter saw heightened volatility in investment markets following the outbreak of the conflict in the Middle East. Against this backdrop, we were pleased with the performance of our investment portfolio which generated a 0.3% return during the first quarter, despite the volatility and higher fixed income yields and spreads. Importantly, our managed investments continue to grow by over 100 million since year-end, and over 400 million during the last 12 months, reaching 2.3 billion. This added scale will continue to support our earnings going forward. Capital management remains a focus for us as market conditions soften. During the first quarter, we repurchased $22.9 million worth of shares, and this month we substantially completed our previous $50 million buyback authorization. We remain confident in the strength of our balance sheet, and the Board has authorized a new buyback program demonstrating our focus on shareholder returns. Turning to our top-line underwriting performance for the first quarter, our portfolio continues to grow into areas of the market where we have found attractive underwriting opportunities. We achieved 4.9% growth in gross written premiums, reaching $430 million in the first quarter. Our overall growth rate continues to moderate given increasing competition in the market. but we have identified select opportunities that align with our appetite, primarily in the casualty segment. As we discussed on our last call, our reception in the market was strong at 1.1, and this performance is a direct result of the hard work of the team leading up to the renewal period. Market capacity continues to increase, driven by the strong retained earnings of the industry over the last several years. Prices are softening and we observed a risk-adjusted rate decline of 5% for the first quarter. Property and specialty markets are experiencing more intense competition and rate softening, but pricing overall remains adequate in our view. Casualty rates are more stable, broadly keeping up with lost trend, and we have seen strong opportunities to grow that portfolio with existing and new seedings. From a loss perspective, the first quarter of 2026 was more benign than the prior year, which included the California wildfires, but was in line with longer-term averages for insured catastrophe losses for the industry. The market is also dealing with the rise in geopolitical uncertainty and the conflict in the Middle East. The event is ongoing and could impact several areas of the market, depending on the extent and duration of the conflict. We do have exposure to the conflict in some of our specialty classes and have recorded an initial loss estimate based on the latest information, which is not material to conduit. With that, I will hand over to Steve for a deeper dive into our market experience across our segments.

Thanks, Neil, and good morning, everyone. It's great to be with you today. As Neil mentioned, I joined the team in January this year and have been working in the industry for nearly three decades. I'm very happy to bring this experience to the CEO role at Conduit. Over my career, I've served in senior positions within underwriting, risk management, and actuarial functions. I spent the first few months getting to know the team and the portfolio and have been pleased with the strength of the people and the opportunities for Conduit going forward. In Q1, the team selectively renewed or secured deals that aligned well with our strategic objectives, primarily seeking to protect our margins and improve earning stability. Turning to the property segment, gross premiums written increased 1% over the prior year period to $248.8 million. This modest growth reflects our success of securing new business and increasing shares on well-priced accounts. while reducing exposure or exiting treaties with poorer performance or terms that did not match our technical pricing standards. We continue to see a strong flow of business opportunities and submissions, and we are carefully picking our participations. As we expected, rates continued to soften in the quarter, and risk-adjusting rates were down 9% across our property portfolio. The rate softening comes on the back of several years of strong rate increases and profitable results for the industry. Despite the recent rate softening, we believe the pricing generally remains adequate and we continue to find select opportunities. Softening was most notable within property catastrophe reinsurance lines driven by robust returns over recent years, increased capacity and a relatively benign loss activity for the market. We expect these softening trends to continue through the mid-year renewals and we will remain nimble and proactive in the competitive environment to target well-priced business. Turning to casualty, in Q1, the team continued to focus on expanding in classes where rate dynamics remain robust and with seasons that have demonstrated track records of prudent cycle management behaviours. Our casualty team has found select new business opportunities on top of strong renewals The increase in this segment complements our short-tail property and specialty business and enhances overall portfolio diversification. For the first quarter, we reported 109.7 million of gross premiums written, representing a 23% increase over the prior year quarter. Expiring business was generally renewed at similar shares while we made deliberate decisions to exit underperforming treaties. where returns or terms were less attractive, supporting ongoing portfolio optimization. Growth for the quarter was largely attributable to U.S. general third-party liability, complemented by incremental gains in smaller subclasses that contributed to portfolio diversification. The rating environment remains attractive in our view, although some classes continue to demonstrate firmer prices than others. We continue to focus on areas of the casualty market with sustained pricing momentum. During the first quarter, risk adjusted rates were down 1% after adjusting for inflation expectations. Looking ahead, we remain mindful of industry loss trends, including some signs of increased loss frequency and past legacy concerns in certain areas. Against this backdrop, our focus is on carefully selecting our partners, improving diversification, and expansion with our preferred partners across complementary classes. Turning to specialty, competition has increased and we have scaled back the portfolio slightly to begin the year, with premiums reducing 4% or $3 million compared to prior year to $71.8 million. Consistent with our plans, we have been able to leverage our strong trading relationships and quota share participations to successfully write some new higher margin excess of loss business. This gradual repositioning will take time, but we expect it will help support our margins as the market softens. Risk-adjusted rates were down 7% in the quarter. The specialty market has become competitive, and the team stepped back from a number of deals that did not meet our expectations or requirements. Instead, the team has prioritised protecting margins and ensuring written deals are adequately priced with the required terms and conditions. loss impacted contracts and selected classes where there has been loss activity have experienced firmer pricing, such as marine and aviation. We have written a few new treaties in these areas. The first quarter has been quite active from a risk loss perspective, in addition to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. We don't expect the direction of the market to change, but there is potential for enhanced geopolitical risk awareness and the ongoing conflict to create further opportunities. we will stand ready to respond should the opportunities align with our appetite. I will now hand over to Elaine to go through our financial and investment highlights.