Argo Group International Holdings, Ltd.

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the Argo Group second quarter 2021 earnings call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one. Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Brett Sheriffs, head of investor relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, and good morning. Welcome to Argo Group's conference call for the second quarter of 2021. After the market closed last night, we issued a press release on our earnings, which is available in the investor section of our website at www.argogroup.com and was filed with the SEC. Presenting on today's call is Kevin Renberg, Chief Executive Officer, and Scott Kirk, Chief Financial Officer. As the operator mentioned, this call is being recorded. As a result of this conference call, ARGO management may make comments that reflect their intentions, beliefs, and expectations for the future. Such forward-looking statements are qualified by the inherent risks and uncertainties surrounding future expectations generally and may materially differ from actual future results involving any one or more of such statements. ARGO Group undertakes no obligation to publicly update forward-looking statements as a result of events or developments subsequent to this call. For more detailed discussion of such risks and uncertainties, please see Argo Group's filings with the SEC. Also note that we will be referencing certain non-GAAP financial information. More information regarding these non-GAAP measures are provided in our earnings release. I will now turn the call over to Kevin Renberg, Chief Executive Officer of Argo Group.

Kevin Renberg Good morning. Thank you for the introduction, Brett. Welcome to everyone on the call. I'm happy to be able to speak to everyone today about a strong quarter on many fronts. The key areas I will focus on during the call are our strong earnings, accelerating growth results, attractive market conditions, and our progress on reducing volatility. As we dive into these areas a little deeper, we will describe how we are delivering on objectives we laid out earlier this year. All of this is with focus on our long-term financial objectives and creating value for shareholders. From an earnings perspective, we reported our best quarterly operating income in more than 10 years. I'm pleased that we had strong contributions from both underwriting and investment results. Our loss ratio of 57.7% for the second quarter reflects lower catastrophe losses, favorable reserve development, and an improved underlying loss ratio. The underlying loss ratio improved modestly from the second quarter of 2020, even though prior year was a particularly tough comparison since, like many in the industry, we benefited from a significant reduction in claims frequency at the beginning of the pandemic. If you look back to the second quarter of 2019, before the pandemic, our underlying loss ratio improved 370 basis points relative to that period, so I'm very pleased with the quarter's results and the overall progress. On the investment side, we reported very strong results with a significant contribution from our alternative investments. we ended the quarter with 13% in return for the positive year-over-year change in gross and net premiums. Those premiums were up approximately 14% in the second quarter after adjusting for businesses sold or placed into runoff over the last 12 months, including Ariel Lee. In the U.S., we continue to see solid rate increases in the mid-to-high single digits on average, This is a bit less than the increase that we experienced over the last couple quarters, but we feel very good about the rates we're getting in direction of our margins. Over the last three years, our cumulative rate change on renewals is about 25% in the U.S. In the U.S., gross premiums were up 7% in the quarter. There was a meaningful top-line impact from our decisions to reduce property exposure in a couple of our underperforming business units. On a year-to-date basis, these actions have been a headwind of more than $50 million to our top line. Performance across our remaining U.S. businesses was strong, and the six business units we highlighted at our investor update, ArgoPro, Casualty, Construction, Environmental, Inland Marine, and Surety, were up 25% collectively during the quarter. These businesses now represent almost two-thirds of our U.S. premium base and, most importantly, remain highly profitable with a combined ratio comfortably in the 80s with minimal catastrophe losses. In terms of submissions, we have continued to see positive trends in submission flow, particularly in our focus business units. Excluding businesses where we have been consciously reducing our exposure, submissions in the U.S. were up 8 percent. Over the past month, we have announced new leaders in three of our U.S. business units. ArgoPro, Construction, and Inland Marine. These individuals included internal promotions and an external hire. They all have strong underwriting backgrounds and have brought diverse perspectives and new energy to the business. We are confident they will be able to take advantage of our platform and market conditions to continue our growth and profit plans. Turning to international, gross premiums would have been up approximately 23% after adjusting for businesses we have exited over the last quarters, an increase from . Reported gross premiums were down about 5% in the second quarter due to the impact of businesses sold or placed into runoff over the last 12 months. Pricing continued to be strong in the quarter, with rate increases averaging just above 10% in international and remain broad-based. Over the past three years, The cumulative rate change for Syndicate 1200 has been 30% and approximately 90% for Bermuda Insurance. These businesses are well positioned to continue to generate attractive underlying margins. Very attractive market conditions across most of our platform and we're taking actions or de-emphasizing business where we're not getting returns we want. Across the group, we have achieved 30% compound renewal rate increases over the last three years. At the end of the day, and of greater significance, we continue to execute on limit reduction efforts to bring down gross and net lines. For example, in ArgoPro's commercial book, we have been able to reduce the average limit by more than 20% over the last 18 months. More than 90% of the portfolio now has limits of $5 million or less. In our excess casualty portfolio, we have continued to increase attachment points and reduce limits. During the first six months of 2021, average attachment points are up 10% while limits are down 10% in our U.S. excess casualty business. In the Bermuda excess casualty book, attachment points are up 15% and limits are down 8% during the first half of the year. Not only is this continued prudent risk management for our balance sheet, but limit reduction protects us from potential spikes in social inflation, and we expect it will help reduce volatility in our underwriting results going forward. The market has allowed us to take these actions while still growing our business, and we have capitalized on these opportunities. On the property side, we are also ahead of plan in terms of net exposure reduction. As we outlined at our investor update in March, we have been focused on bringing down our average annual loss, AAL, and probable maximum loss, PMLs. This work has been through a combination of lower gross exposure and some changes to our seeded reinsurance program. Back in March, we outlined a plan to reduce our AAL by 40% by the end of 2022. Through our gross property reductions and some additional reinsurance purchases, we have already completed this reduction as of July 1st. more than a year ahead of schedule. Since the beginning of the year, we have also reduced our peak 1 in 250 year PML to less than 4% of our common equity. This is ahead of the schedule we laid out a few months ago and gives us comfort as we head further into wind season, particularly in light of all the other natural catastrophes occurring and the inflation already associated with those events. In total, I'm very pleased with our results for the quarter and the progress we've been able to make on our strategic objectives. I will now turn the call over to Scott to discuss our results in more detail.

Thank you, Kevin, and good morning, everybody. As Kevin touched on, we reported strong earnings during the second quarter of 2021 driven by continued improvement in our combined ratio in addition to a strong contribution from alternative investments. Our operating EPS was $1.60 for the second quarter and marks the highest quarterly operating income in more than a decade, with both underwriting and investments contributing to the results. Argo's annualised operating return on common equity was 13.1%. Turning to our consolidated operating results, gross written premiums increased 2% in the second quarter of 2021. However, allowing for the impact of the sale of aerial wee in 2020, and the exits of our Italian, Malta, and US grocery businesses announced over the last few quarters, premiums were up approximately 14% during the second quarter of 2021. Now, while gross premiums increased 2%, growth in net written and net earned premiums was higher at approximately 8% in the quarter. And as we discussed previously, there are a couple of key drivers of net premium growth. First, we retain very little of Ariel Reeve's business on a net basis. So this exit has a relatively small impact on our net written and net earned premiums. And second, in 2021, we are taking a larger share of Syndicate 1200 results where we retain a higher portion of that business net. And we would expect net premium growth to continue to outpace the change in gross written premiums for the balance of this year. In the second quarter of 2021, we reported a loss ratio of 57.7%, down 5.3 points from 63% during the prior year period. The improvement reflected lower CAT losses, favourable reserve development, and an improved ex-CAT current accident year loss ratio. Our CAT losses totaled $11 million, or 2.4 points of the combined ratio in the second quarter of 2021, of which 6 million related to natural catastrophes and 5 million related to the impact from COVID. This result compares favourably to catastrophe losses of $28 million or 6.4 points in the prior year quarter, which included $17 million related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Favorable reserve development totaled $1 million, or 0.3 points, in the second quarter of 2021, with modest favorable development in both our U.S. and international segments. The prior year quarter included $2 million, or 0.4 points, of adverse reserve development. The XCAT current accident year loss ratio came in at 55.6% in the second quarter, which represents a 60 basis point improvement from the prior year quarter. The improvements reflect the impact of continued rate increases as well as the benefits from our underwriting actions. Turning now to expenses, our expense ratio was 37.7% in the second quarter of 2021 and was up 80 basis points from the prior year quarter, but a slight improvement on the first quarter of this year. The main driver of the increase in our expense ratio was an increase in our acquisition expenses. Our acquisition ratio increased by 130 basis points to 17.4%, which is driven primarily by changes in business mix. Conversely, the general and administrative expense ratio of 20.3% improved when compared to both Q2 2020 and the first quarter of this year as we continue to focus on managing expenses. As we said previously, we expect to drive the expense ratio lower through a combination of higher earned premium and identified expense savings. As expected, earned premium growth is driving the better G&A ratio at the early stages of our program. We are making good progress against reducing future G&A expenses, and we should start to see some of the benefits emerge in the coming quarters. We have said this improvement was not going to be linear, and we remain committed to the 36% expense ratio target in 2022. You will notice that we also incurred $11 million of non-operating expenses in the second quarter of 2021. These costs primarily related to certain initiatives that are aimed at reducing our expense base longer term. As an example, during the second quarter, we took action to proactively reduce our real estate footprint and we expect the benefits to begin to materialise in 2022. Turning to our segment results, in the US, grocery premiums were up 7% compared with the second quarter of 2020. Growth was primarily driven by liability and professional lines, while premiums in property lines declined. Adjusting for the impact of exiting the grocery business and targeted underwriting actions to reduce property focus and certain underperforming businesses Gross return premiums were up 20% during the second quarter. The U.S. segment reported underwriting income of $25 million and a combined ratio of 92% in the second quarter of 2021. The loss ratio was 58.3% compared with 56.8% in the prior year second quarter. It is worth noting that the loss ratio in Q2 2020 benefited from a reduction in claims frequency due to the broader economic slowdown. whilst the current quarter claim activity was more in line with our expectations. The expense ratio of 33.7% was up two points from the prior year quarter, this primarily driven by a higher acquisition ratio, while the G&A ratio was broadly flat. The increase in the acquisition ratio was primarily driven by changes in business mix. Turning now to our international segment, grocery and premiums declined 5% in the second quarter of 2021, due to the previously announced business exits, with the largest decrease in property lines. Excluding the impact of these actions, gross written premiums would have increased approximately 23% in the second quarter of 2021. The increase was largely driven by our increased participation in Syndicate 1200's results, in addition to rate increases. Net written premiums increased 15% versus the prior year quarter, due mainly to the sale of Aerial Re, as we historically retained only a small portion of this premium on a net basis. As we continue through the year, we expect the net to gross retention in international will continue to increase relative to the prior year period. In the second quarter of 2021, net premium retention was up at 58% compared with 48% in the prior year quarter. International reported underwriting income of $8 million in the second quarter of 2021 compared to an underwriting loss of $27 million in the prior year quarter. The reported combined ratio was 95.1% and reflects a significantly improved ex-cat accident year loss ratio, reduced cat losses, favorable development, and a lower expense ratio. The current accident year ex-CAT loss ratio was 51%, which decreased 830 basis points from the prior year quarter. The improvement was largely due to improved rates earning through the result and a reduction in large loss frequency compared to the second quarter of 2020. CAT losses during the second quarter of 2021 were $9 million, or six points of the combined ratio. These losses did include some strengthening to our loss estimates related to winter storm URIE, as well as losses related to COVID-19 on our event cancellation exposures. The expense ratio of 39.4% was down 4% from the prior year quarter, with improvements in both the acquisition ratio and the G&A ratio. The acquisition expense ratio was 20.1%, was down 50 basis points compared to the second quarter of 2020. We've previously spoken about exiting business with higher acquisition costs, and the benefit of these actions continue to earn through. The G&A expense ratio decreased just under four points from the prior year quarter to 19.3%, and this was largely attributable to growth in earned premiums. Moving on to investments, we reported net investment income of $53 million in the quarter. The results included $30 million of income from alternative investments, principally mark-to-market gains on our private equity and hedge fund investments. Although we're certainly pleased with this result, I would caution that the last four quarters have included elevated returns from these investments. Now, net investment income from the remainder of our portfolio was $23 million in the quarter, which was down 8% from the prior year quarter. This decline reflects the de-risking actions over the last 18 to 24 months, as well as lower overall yields available in the market. And finally, our book value per share of $50.34 at June 30 increased 5%, including dividends, from the end of the first quarter 2021. The increase was driven by strong retained earnings and modest net unrealized gains on our fixed income securities. Now, this quarter provided some nice growth in our balance sheet and capital position. We continue to see attractive uses for that capital in the business today, as evidenced by our targeted growth and solid underwriting margins. Now, while this remains our top priority in terms of deploying capital, we currently have approximately $50 million remaining our share repurchase authority under the 2016 Share Repurchase Program. Now, subject to market conditions and other factors, we may begin repurchasing shares prior to year end. Operator, that concludes our prepared remarks, and we are now ready to take questions.

Thank you. And we will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then 1 on your touch-tone phone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star then 2. Our first question today will come from Casey Alexander with CompassPoint. Please go ahead.

Yeah. Yeah, hi. Good morning. My questions related to the expense ratio were already answered, but just one question for Kevin. In the segment of the business where you discussed the increasing the attachment point and lowering the limit, What's happening to rate inside that business? Because if rate is staying the same while you're increasing the attachment point and lowering the limit, it sort of works as a de facto price increase, even though you're not getting an increase in rate, if I understand that correctly.

Yeah, good morning, Casey. That is exactly right. However, the rate is those lines we addressed. So in the commercial... Once we highlight it, it's a double-digit return. I mean, a double-digit price increase. And on excess utility, it's a long double-digit return, 25% on some of them in the U.S. And on international, it is – just bear with me a minute because you're asking a little bit more detail down the line.

I hate to say this, Kevin, but you're completely breaking up on us. I can't really understand any part of your answer. Can you hear me now? You're still breaking up quite a bit. I'll tell you what, you guys can come back to me offline with the answer. That's the last of my questions. Thanks. Thank you. Thanks, Casey.

And our next question will come from Greg Peters with Raymond James. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning. So just to pile on, Kevin, if you're calling in on a cell phone or wherever you're calling from, you're definitely fading in and out. It's virtually impossible to understand how you're answering. So maybe it can pivot the answer to someone else here. But the only question I will have you know, today would be focused on just the legacy accident years where there have been prior period reserve development. Of course, I'm speaking to, you know, the London, the Bermuda, the professional liability within domestic. And I guess what I'm looking for is any color around, you know, our new claims, closed claims, you know, open claims, unresolved claims, where we are in that spectrum because clearly you know the stock is you know there's concerns out there that you know there might be some more legacy charges at some point so maybe you can help us to understand that thank you uh scott since i'm breaking up do you want to take this i'm going to try and dial in back in thanks yeah yeah thanks and thanks greg look i mean i'll go back to the fact that we have a robust reserving process

clearly we look back at all of the trends that are there. I mean, yes, there are always going to be ups and downs across various lines and across various years. But the reality is that, you know, I think we remain very comfortable with our reserving position as it stands. I mean, you know, I think that's the best way to answer that question.

Well, I mean, honestly, you didn't answer the question because we're just, you know, The legacy reserves that, you know, the legacy acts and years that resulted in all of the reserve charges, it's been several quarters since we've seen anything like that. But, you know, if we could have some and maybe you don't have the information available right now, but if we could have some information about, you know, just where we are with those legacy claims, are they, you know, are we. Are we 90% of the way through the open claims? Are there no new claims on those action years? Things like that would be very helpful. And I understand if you're not prepared to answer it right now, but in the context of just gaining confidence on the go-forward picture, that would be very helpful. And that was my only point.

Yeah. Okay, Greg. Look, I get your point there. I mean... Clearly, you know, obviously we have the RITC that was in there that we completed last year. I think that's, you know, that's for 2017 and prior years. So there's, you know, greater certainty or certainly around those from 2017. from our international business. But, look, leave it with us, and we'll come back to you for some greater clarity around those.

Yeah, thank you. And on the RITC, I mean, you raise a good point. That's in there. But is it capped out? I mean, one of the risks when we see things like that is you blow through the top of it on legacy, and then it comes back to bite. I'm not sure if those accident years are completely closed out through the RITC or – Or maybe I'm misunderstanding it altogether.

Yeah, look, we can get you some details on that for sure and come back. Got it.

Thanks so much for your time. Congratulations on the quarter. Yeah, no problem. Yeah, thanks, Greg. Appreciate it.

And our next question will come from Jeff Schmidt with William Blair. Please go ahead.

Hi. Good morning, everyone. Could you talk about the COVID losses in the international book? They're around $5 million and a quarter. Are you seeing claims sort of continue to roll in from the pandemic, or is that stopped and you're really just settling past claims at this point? Or is it sort of Delta emergence kind of resulting in some new claims? I mean, there's been restrictions put back on in various places. So can you just help me think through that?

Yeah, it's Kevin. Can you hear me all right now?

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. So I apologize for that before. I'm now on a cell phone. I was not on a cell phone before. Okay. So as we did mention when we first started, you know, going through the COVID losses that we expected that they would decline by quarter. And the last two quarters have been relatively flat, which isn't surprising since the pandemic's taken longer. These are things that are associated with our contingent liability book. And, you know, as an example, the, you know, things around the Olympics or concert events, Festivals that were moved out and moved on. Some have been moved on and canceled. Some have moved on and people have unfortunately died. There's a number of things that have happened. So we'll continue to see probably some very small numbers there. But like we said in the beginning, we expected it to decline. And it's only the further extent of the pandemic related to that book that we're seeing at this point.

Okay. And then the underlying loss ratio in international, obviously down quite a bit, 51%, hasn't been that low in a long time. Can you help us sort of quantify the drivers of that? I mean, how much of that's driven by the business mix changing? You know, how much is really rate in excess of loss costs? And I guess why not why not just play it safer there at this, at this point until we get a little farther, uh, you know, past the pandemic?

Yeah, those are, that's a good question. We've been re underwriting that book since 2018 in some circumstances, right? So you're into the fourth year of underwriting actions and, uh, removal from, you know, completely getting out of certain lines. So, uh, When it comes to playing it safer, we've got to be realistic about what the actual losses look like and what they are and the ratios range depending on the product lines. But we have gotten out of things that were significantly problematic for us, and we've reduced our overall exposure. So we started highlighting the underlying loss ratio and the improvement there. In that book, going back to the second half of last year where it started to get – on an adjusted basis for what we were remaining in into the low 50s. So it's just in line with what we've been saying, and we're happy to see it continue.

Okay. Thanks for the answers.

And our next question will come from Matt Corletti with JMP. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks. Good morning. The larger picture questions I was going to ask have been answered. I just have a couple kind of more specific questions relating to Syndicate 1200, and those are, one, I was hoping you could – kind of tell us what the funds at Lloyd's requirements are and just trying to sort through kind of the moving pieces there in terms of the moving mix of business, as well as the increased retention. And then also, you know, where has that been running on a combined ratio basis, either Q1, Q2 or six months, whatever kind of metric you might have.

All right, Matt. So on 1200, we are, as we mentioned, we took a larger, uh, retention last year. So we kept more of the business with less third party and we are effectively keeping that business flat and expect to do so as we go forward. But the underwriting results are improving as we continue to get right through the various lines and the market conditions remain favorable. We are exiting the businesses that we wanted to exit. So we feel good about where that's going at the moment.

Okay, thank you. And once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star then one. Our next question will come from Ron Bobman with Capital Returns. Please go ahead.

Hi, thanks a lot. A good report and welcome to the call, Kevin. It's good to hear you, the back portion. So you didn't really explicitly answer Matt's, the last question. Is $1,200 profitable from an underwriting perspective, either on the half year or second quarter?

Yeah, it is on both. Sorry about that. It is on both.

Okay.

Hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on. Ex-URI, right? The underlying stuff, right? So from a CAT standpoint, URI was costly there, but the underlying business ex-CAT we feel really good about.

Okay. All right. And then I had a question about the U.S. insurance business. What portion of that, I guess from a GWP perspective, comes by way of a program manager or underwriting manager?

Oh, the percentage of the total?

Yeah, roughly. What percentage of the book is coming through sort of some degree of – delegated authority, whether it's a program manager or a, yeah.

All right. So, so we highlighted that in the investor update and I don't remember off the top of my head right now. Um, but the, it, what looks like it, it had where it looks like it has grown in the last year is because Trident moved from in-house to a program manager. So that would have been the large increase. Uh, and those are folks that worked here for years. So, um, We'll get you the exact numbers, but I believe it would be in line with what it was for where we highlighted it as a percentage in the investor update. Okay. It would be under what we call specialty programs.

Okay. I'll circle back afterwards to get in the ballpark on that. And do you have a funds at Lloyd's figure for $1,200? Yes.

I don't know. Scott, do you have that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Ron, there's a couple of pieces to this, right? Because there's like 100% for the syndicate or there's our share of the syndicate. And you have to be careful of that because we don't have 100% ownership. But look, I'll give you a ballpark. It's not going to be hugely different. It's around the 300 to 350 million pound mark.

Okay, but you're at 90% of the syndicate now, right?

Isn't that the... Yeah, for the 21-year, yes, but you do have a blend of ownership levels across the various years. So I would point you, if you ever want to go and have a look at the syndicate results, I think, you know, we can... Well, I'll have to check whether they're out there, but I think it's around the 350.

Okay. Now, I read the Lloyd's report, but I didn't see the FAL number in there. And then the 3 to 350 pounds ballpark, that's the amount that covers really 18, 19, 20, and year-to-date 21. It's sort of supporting all of those years, right?

That is correct. Yeah, it does support all of those years.

Okay, got you. All right, thanks for the help. I'm done. Thanks, guys.

And this will conclude our question and answer session. I'd like to turn the conference back over to Kevin Renberg for any closing remarks.

Yeah, thanks, everybody, for your interest and support. Thanks to our employees and producers for continuing to do what we've been doing. And I would also welcome anyone to call back for any pieces where I broke up earlier in the call. I apologize for that. and look forward to connecting with you soon. Thank you.

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect your lines at this time.