Axis Capital Holdings Limited

Good day, and welcome to the Access Capital's first quarter 2019 earnings conference call. All participants will be in 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 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Matt Rohrman, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Sean. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm happy to welcome you to our conference call to discuss the financial results for Axis Capital for the first quarter and period ended at March 31st, 2019. Our earnings press release and financial supplement were issued yesterday. evening after the market closed. If you'd like copies, please visit the investor information section of our website at accesscapital.com. We set aside an hour for today's call, which is also available as an audio webcast through the investor information section of our website. A replay of the teleconference will be available by dialing 877-344-7529 in the U.S. and the international number 412-317-0088. The conference code for both replay dialing numbers is 101-301-61. With me on today's call are Albert Benchimol, our President and CEO, and Pete Vogt, our CFO. Before I turn the call over to Albert, I will remind everyone that the statements made during this call, including the question and answer session, which are not historical facts, may be forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions. Actual events or results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, including the risk factors set forth in ACTS's most recent form on 10-K, as well as the additional risks identified in the cautionary note regarding forward-looking statements and our earnings press release issued yesterday evening. We undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements. In addition, this presentation may contain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations are included in our earnings press release and financial supplement, which can be found on the investor information section of our website, located at accesscapital.com. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Albert.

Thank you, Matt. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our first quarter call. We've brought our performance back to double-digit operating ROE on an ex-PCAP basis this quarter, in line with the results we produced in the first nine months of 2018. The underlying results improved for all of our lines other than the two that were affected by large industry losses. This reflects the disciplined actions we've taken in recent years to strengthen our market position, improve our portfolio profitability, and reduce volatility. While catastrophe activity was low this quarter, we did absorb meaningful market increases in loss estimates for the Japanese windstorms Jebi and Trami, all of which led to an XPGAP operating ROE of 10.2 for the quarter. As we progress further into 2019, we remain steadfast in sustaining our momentum. This explains the small reductions in gross written premiums in the quarter. Our new business production was more than offset by reductions from canceled or non-renewed business that is no longer in alignment with our profitability and volatility goals. Separately, we're also pushing forward on a number of exciting initiatives that will advance our leadership, put more tools in the hands of our underwriters, and increase our responsiveness to our clients and partners in distribution. We're entering the final stages of integrating Novi into our business. In less than a year and a half, we've brought our organizations together and are operating as one company. The combined book was renewed into a single syndicate at January 1, and next Monday, we're scheduled to move all of our London teams into a single office. To the credit of our team and the very hard work done by many individuals within our combined organization, we've successfully integrated our companies, pursued more than $60 million in Synergy savings, and strengthened our position in a market that is much more attractive today than it was at the time of the purchase. This gives me great confidence that the acquisition will ultimately be judged as a significant positive for Axis. We've also continued our enterprise-wide efficiency drive. As of this quarter, Our combined net savings from integration and transformation activities amounted to $69 million on an annualized basis against our target of $100 million, which we intend to reach by the end of 2020. These net savings are net of incremental investments in our future. These include advancing initiatives to enhance enterprise agility, grow our digital technology and new product capabilities, and better leverage data to support our underwriting. Perhaps most importantly, we've invested in growing our talent, which will ultimately drive our success. With all this activity in progress, we remain confident that we are well on our path to leadership in key markets, generating profitable growth, and improving our performance to consistently deliver double-digit ROEs. Later during the call, I'll speak on some of the trends that we're seeing in the marketplace. But now, Pete will walk us through our first quarter results.