Cincinnati Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:CINF) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Charles Peters: Okay. And then I guess the final question would be on Personal Lines because if we look at your results for the quarter, actually, you’re doing pretty well in the context of how the rest of the market is performing. And you’re also reporting some substantial growth in new business written. So — maybe give us sort of an updated view on the trends you’re seeing inside your Personal Lines business. And I’m thinking about auto and property, clearly. So if you could separate the 2, that would be great.

Stephen Spray: Sure. First of all, I might comment — just we’re pleased and encouraged by the improvement in ex-cat. Actually the core loss ratio that we’re seeing in Personal Lines as well, certainly had some pressure with inflation and with increased cat levels, but feel like we are — I shouldn’t say feel like, we’re confident that we’re getting the rate on a prospective go-forward basis that’s adequate. The fact that about 55% of our Personal Lines today would be what we call private client, 45% roughly middle market. We think that is a key for us with our agency model in the marketplace. That we can be a go-to care for our agents on — regardless of the size of the home. And the way we handle claims locally fast [indiscernible] with empathy, we think, puts us in a really good position going forward on all Personal Lines.

Yes, it’s — the loss ratio has been — has certainly been under pressure with inflation and the increased cat activity, but we’re confident in where it’s headed going forward. We see a lot of opportunity out there. A lot of disruption in that Personal Lines market. Candidly, I’ve never seen a harder market than the Personal Lines market we’re seeing today. And we think with our balance sheet, our agency strategy, the way we’re approaching it, the expertise, the pricing precision, we think it’s going to bode well for us in the future to grow that Personal Lines book.

Operator: The next question is from Mike Zaremski with BMO.

Michael Zaremski: I guess maybe going back to kind of the topic of growth and risk selection. And maybe just sticking with Commercial Lines. So if I kind of just step back, Cincinnati Financial’s pricing power levels are fairly similar to a number of your peers yet your growth rate, just overall growth rate is much lower than your historical growth rate relative to the industry, which you’ve been talking about this about changing your appetite a bit and every quarter, this isn’t like a surprise. But just kind of then curious like, are — I would have thought, it doesn’t seem like you’re losing business because of pricing because your pricing levels are similar to peers. So is it — or maybe I’m wrong and in just certain lines, actually, you’re actually — we’re looking at all-in rate and certain lines, you actually are casualty raising a lot more than the average.

Or is the — has your fundamental risk selection process change that you’re just not willing to take on certain risks or you’re trying to shed certain risks and kind of just kind of see where we are in this kind of journey to whether the — your historical growth rate will get back to what it used to be historically relative to the industry if your appetite decides to change.

Stephen Spray: Yes. Mike, Steve Spray again. Steve Johnston commented in his opening remarks on the net written premium piece of Commercial as I might start there in that we’ve got a 2 full point drag on Commercial Lines from workers’ compensation and umbrella or excess you could call it, both for different reasons. We’re comp about 1 point drag, that has been going on now for several years. Just simply, the rate decreases that are being pushed through really for the industry. On umbrella, that is deliberate. It started probably a little over a year ago here in Commercial Lines. In certain jurisdictions, certain states, we really took aggressive, appropriate underwriting action on our umbrella book, reducing limits, maybe shedding some of that business.