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(Alliance News) - Beazley PLC reported growth in premiums in its first half, and the insurer lifted its outlook, and it talked up its "highly resilient" cyber risk offering which weathered July's IT mayhem.
Beazley is a London-based specialist insurance underwriter, managing six Lloyd's of London syndicates. It said pretax profit nearly doubled to USD728.9 million in the six months that ended June 30 from USD336.4 million a year before.
Insurance written premiums rose by 6.9% to USD3.12 billion from USD2.92 billion a year before, and Beazley's combined ratio improved to 77% from 84%. Any combined ratio below 100% means a provide on underwriting, so the lower the better.
As a result, Beazley said its insurance service result increased by 63% to USD558.0 million from USD342.2 million.
"Expertise in underwriting and active risk selection are key drivers of this strong result, even as the rating environment is moderating," commented Chief Executive Officer Adrian Cox.
Net assets per share and net tangible assets per share both increased by 34% from a year before, to 504.7 pence and 483.1p, respectively, as of June 30.
The insurer said it was tested by the recent global IT outage caused by a faulty software upgrade by cyber security firm CrowdStrike Holdings Inc.
"When faced with the world's largest ever IT outage, Beazley's approach to underwriting cyber risk was tested and proved to be highly resilient," Cox said. "We see opportunities in the remainder of the year and are confident in delivering on our high single-digit growth guidance."
Beazley also improved its 2024 guidance for its combined ratio to about 80%.
Analysts at Jefferies commented: "Beazley has improved its FY24 undiscounted combined ratio guidance to 'around 80%', from 'low 80s', which is very encouraging given we are only in August."
Beazley declared no interim dividend, unchanged from a year before. However, it said the USD325 million share buyback that it announced back in March is on track to complete by the end of the year.
Shares in Beazley were up 11% at 709.50 pence each in London on Thursday.
By Eric Cunha, Alliance News news editor
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