American Coastal Insurance Corporation

Greetings and welcome to the American Coastal Insurance Corporation's first quarter 2026 earnings conference call and webcast. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow a formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, press star zero on your telephone keypad as a reminder that this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to your host, Jeremy Hellman, Vice President at the Equity Group and American Coastal Insurance Corporation. Thank you.

Thank you, Operator, and good afternoon, everyone. American Coastal Insurance Corporation has also made this broadcast available on its website at www.mcoastal.com. A replay will be available for approximately 30 days following the call. Additionally, you can find copies of the latest earnings release and presentation in the Investors section of the company's website. Speaking today will be President and Chief Executive Officer Bennett Bradford-Martz and Chief Financial Officer Svetlana Castle. On behalf of the company, I'd like to note that statements made during this call that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements. The company believes these statements are based on reasonable estimates, assumptions, and plans. However, if the estimates, assumptions, or plans underlying the forward-looking statements prove inaccurate, or if other risks or uncertainties arise, actual results could differ materially from those expressed in or implied by the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially may be found in the company's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in the risk factor section in our most recent annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date on which they are made and, except as required by applicable law, the company undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. With that, it is my pleasure to turn the call over to Brad Martz. Brad?

Thank you and welcome everyone. During the first quarter of 2026, American Coastal continued to be patient and disciplined in navigating a rapidly softening commercial property insurance market. Most of our risk portfolio continues to produce exceptional results, evidenced by our fantastic loss and combined ratios. Average account rate decreases are distorting comparability with gross premiums, but premium production only tells part of the story. Looking deeper reveals American Coastal's account retention was in line with our targets, and our policy count and exposure base actually increased at the end of the current quarter versus the same period a year ago. This is strong evidence that ACIC continues to protect and defend its market leadership position. The key to ACIC's long-term success has been our ability to maintain an adequate margin throughout the cycle. Having a strong underlying combined ratio is what ultimately enables us to retain catastrophe risk and produce an acceptable risk-adjusted return on capital over time. Thus, despite losing right on the front end, we are maintaining margin because loss costs and reinsurance costs are also moving the right direction. I'm pleased to report that our June 1, 2026 Core Catastrophe Reinsurance Program is effectively complete, and we are very pleased with the outcome. The key takeaways are, first, we were able to secure risk-adjusted reinsurance cost decreases that were necessary for us to remain both very competitive and profitable. Second, we increased our exhaustion point up to over $1.6 billion, expected to exceed the 250-year return time using the most recent version of Bear Risk's hurricane model. including demand surge and a 10% load for loss adjustment expenses. Third, we have moved our lower layers to an all perils basis that will allow us to non-renew the January 1st all other perils catastrophe reinsurance program next year while maintaining robust protection against potential non-hurricane cat events. And lastly, we have more aggregate protection against frequency and severity resulting from a potentially active hurricane season. Pages 11, 12, and 13 of our earnings presentation provide some additional information regarding our reinsurance program renewals. For the core CAD in particular, American Coastal is still evaluating various retention options, and that is expected to be completed very soon. Once finalized, We will disclose more details regarding our hurricane retentions as well as the expected total cost of the 6-1 renewal. I want to personally thank our reinsurance partners for their incredible support and thoughtfulness as we keep moving forward together. I'd like to now turn it over to our CFO, Lana Castle, for more specifics on our financial results.