W.R. Berkley Q4 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
January 26, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Record 2025 financial results: Q4 operating earnings were $450M ($1.13/share) and full-year net income was $1.8B, delivering a 21.4% return on beginning-of-year equity and strong operating cash flow ($3.6B for 2025).
  • Positive Sentiment: Underwriting strength and efficiency: Record quarterly pre-tax underwriting income, a current accident‑year combined ratio ex‑cats of 87.9% (calendar year 89.4%) and an improved expense ratio of 28.2% with guidance to remain comfortably below 30% in 2026.
  • Positive Sentiment: Capital returns and balance‑sheet flexibility: Management returned $971M to shareholders in 2025 (including $608M in Q4), retains a historically low financial leverage ratio of 22.6%, and says buybacks/dividends will remain opportunistic.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Investments and portfolio positioning: Invested assets rose 11.4% to $33.2B with fixed-maturity income up quarter-over-quarter, duration extended to ~3 years and credit quality AA‑, but results included $32M of investment fund losses driven by one disappointing fund.
  • Negative Sentiment: Market headwinds and line‑specific pressure: Persistent weakness in auto liability, intense competition in large account property/reinsurance (notably a 19% risk‑adjusted rate decrease on its main cat treaty) and pressure in some professional lines (D&O, A&E) raise near‑term underwriting risk and could spill into casualty markets.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
W.R. Berkley Q4 2025
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us, and welcome to the W. R. Berkley Corporation Q4 and Full Year 2025 Earnings Call. This conference call is being recorded. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please raise your hand. If you have dialed into today's call, please press star nine to raise your hand and star six to unmute. The speaker's remarks may contain forward-looking statements. Some of the forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words, including, without limitation, believes, expects or estimates. We caution you that such forward-looking statements should not be regarded as a representation by us that the future plans, estimates, or expectations contemplated by us will in fact be achieved.

Operator

Please refer to our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended 31 December 2024, and our other filings made with the SEC for a description of the business environment in which we operate and the important factors that may materially affect our results. W. R. Berkley Corporation is not under any obligation and expressly disclaims any such obligation to update or alter its forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Rob Berkley. Please go ahead, sir.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Kevin, thank you very much, and good afternoon, all. Let me echo Kevin's welcome to our Q4 call, and we appreciate everyone finding the time to tune in, and certainly are grateful for your interest in the company. On this end of the call, you also, in addition to me, you have Rich Baio and Bill Berkley, and we are going to be following our typical pattern as we have in the past, where I'm going to offer a couple of quick soundbites, and we're going to hand it over to Rich. He's going to do the heavy lift as far as walking us through some highlights on the quarter and the year. Then I will trail behind him with a few more soundbites, and then, of course, we're very pleased to entertain questions.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Before we get rolling here, though, it seems like perhaps the most appropriate place to start would be with a few words of gratitude. Those of you that have had an opportunity to review the release, and certainly as you hear Rich's comments, I think it will come into sharp focus that 2025 was yet another great year for the company. As I've shared with some in the past, these type of outcomes, they don't happen on their own. They happen because people make it happen. People go above and beyond to achieve a goal. And, I just wanted to express my gratitude and a heartfelt congratulations to approximately 7,600 people that all come together to really deliver a great outcome for the good, not only of our shareholders, but to all stakeholders that we serve.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So again, thank you and congratulations. A couple of macro observations, not particularly insightful, but perhaps it'll invite some conversation a little bit later on. Number one is, I think it is clear as day that the world is moving at an ever-increasing pace. The world is becoming ever more complicated, and in my mind, and I think the minds of many others, is the simple question whether this industry is going to be able to keep up with that pace of change. We are not an industry that has been able to embrace change. In fact, I think the industry has really struggled with change over generations, but the challenge is before us. Clearly, one of the areas that is creating some of the greatest challenge and is driving this trajectory of change to be so steep and the velocity to be so significant is technology.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

And the tip of that spear, without a doubt, these days, is AI. There's a lot of discussion around AI and what it means for the industry. Much of the conversation, appropriately, is focused on the adoption. How will the industry adopt these tools? What will it mean from an operational perspective? And these are certainly questions that we are grappling with actively, and we are well on our way to be utilizing many of these tools throughout our organization. But from our perspective, that's not the only question. One also needs to be grappling with the question of: What does this mean for us as underwriters?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

How do we think about these new technologies and the impact they're having on society, the impact that they're having on our insureds, what it means for risk, and our ability to fully understand that risk so we can control it, select it, and price for it? We, as an organization, are particularly well-situated or quite frankly, built for this type of change. We have the best of both worlds. We have the scale to be able to participate at any level. At the same time, because of our structure, we have the agility to be able to pivot quickly, and in addition to that, we have the benefit of not putting all of our chips on red or black. In fact, we have 60 different incubators where we're able to experiment, learn, and then cross-pollinate. Another area of great change is the topic of distribution.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

There is no doubt that customers are changing, customers' priorities are changing. But in addition to that, the relationship between traditional distribution and carriers is, without a doubt, evolving. Once upon a time, it was a very simple, straightforward relationship. One was the factory, the other was the distributor. But today, traditional partners, traditional distribution, oftentimes is not just a partner, but is actually a competitor. Furthermore, we are actively looking at changes, as I mentioned a moment ago, in the behaviors of customers. Customers are much more comfortable with a self-serve model, and it is becoming increasingly clear that convenience is more important to many customers than price. Please do not misunderstand my comments. We are very committed to our partners.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

At the same time, it is not lost on us that the customer is queen or king, and that we, as an organization, are going to do what we need to do to meet them where, when, and how they wish to be met. Let me move on to a couple of comments about the marketplace, more specifically. Let me start with the ugly. Auto Liability is something that we have been talking about... I don't know, Richie, it's got to be a couple of years at this stage. It continues to be a challenge. And from my perspective, while we did speak about possibly seeing some green shoots, I guess it would have been early in 2025, that proved to be a mirage.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

As it's turned out, the market has continued to find new lows, and our hope is, as we make our way towards the end of 2026, we find a bottom. In addition to that, I think last quarter and perhaps the quarter before, but certainly last quarter, we talked about large account property, particularly shared and layered. I would suggest to you that this market is a feeding frenzy at this stage. And furthermore, I would tell you that London, particularly Lloyd's, is perhaps the hotspot for this feeding frenzy. On the topic of property reinsurance, maybe a little forward-looking because it relates to 1/1. A data point for you all as it relates to our property cat treaty, our main treaty. Our risk-adjusted rate decrease was 19%.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So from my perspective, I think that speaks volumes to the challenges in the market and perhaps what will be waterfalling and making the marketplace more competitive. Let me also suggest that we are seeing early signs that the competitiveness in the property cat market would seem to be spilling over into the casualty market. I think many participants are struggling, quite frankly, with getting to their premium targets on the property front, and as a result of that, are trying to lean into the casualty to try and hit their top line. The big difference is the property cat market had a bounce a couple of years ago, so they are starting from a different altitude. Casualty never really had that bounce. Moving over to professional, as we've talked about in the past, D&O remains a challenge, and I would add A&E, architects and engineers.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Some of the brighter spots, because it is not all doom and gloom, I would suggest, is the casualty market. In particular, I would tell you that the smaller end of town and the excess and umbrella market are both offering opportunity for meaningful rate. E&S also stands out, but there is clearly opportunity in the standard market as well. I would also flag within the A&H space, Medical Stop-Loss continues to be an attractive place from our perspective. Berkley One, our private client operation, continues to see great opportunity to grow as they continue to be a preferred alternative for the marketplace. And finally, last but not least, what we've been talking about for some extended period of time, Workers' Compensation.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

While it is not rosy at this stage, there are early signs that are coming into focus that perhaps participants in the California market are starting to come to grips with reality, and that there is some early signs of a backbone reemerging. So, I went on a lot longer than I promised, but that's not the first time that's happened. But that's just because after they listen to you, Rich, they all tune out. So I got it off my chest and why don't you go ahead and run with it, please.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Okay, great. Thanks, Rob. Good evening, everyone. As Rob mentioned, the Q4 closed out an outstanding 2025 full year, with record quarterly operating earnings of $450 million, or $1.13 per share, growing 9.5% over the prior year, with a 21.4% return on beginning of year equity. Net income of $450 million or $1.13 per share also resulted in a 21.4% return on beginning of year equity. Record quarterly pre-tax underwriting income and strong net investment income from our core portfolio contributed to the excellent quarterly results. Beginning first with our underwriting performance, continued rate improvement, lower catastrophe losses, and prudent expense management resulted in record quarterly pre-tax underwriting income of $338 million, an improvement of 14.9% over the prior year.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Current accident year cat losses in the current quarter declined to $48 million or 1.5 loss ratio points. The expense ratio improved to 28.2%, driven by record net premiums earned of $3.2 billion, as well as operational efficiencies arising from investments in technology, business process outsourcing, and a non-recurring benefit for commission-related accruals. We expect that our expense ratio will continue to be comfortably below 30% in 2026, barring a meaningful change in the marketplace. The current accident year loss ratio, excluding cats for the quarter, was 59.7%, slightly better than the 2 preceding sequential quarters. The shift from 1 quarter to the next is largely driven by each operating unit's contribution to the whole, which is influenced by where we may be growing or pulling back based on market conditions.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

In sum, the current accident year combined ratio ex cats is 87.9%, and the calendar year combined ratio is 89.4%. By segment, current accident year loss ratio ex cats for insurance improved to 60.6% and remained relatively flat to the full year results for 2024 and 2025. The reinsurance and monoline excess segment was 53.9%, resulting in a strong current accident year combined ratio ex cats of 83%. Strong operating cash flows of nearly $1 billion for the quarter and $3.6 billion for the full year have contributed to the increase in our invested assets, which grew 11.4% during 2025 to $33.2 billion, reaching a record level.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

The combination of investable assets like cash and short-term assets, as well as the roll-off of fixed maturities at book yields below the new money rate, positions us well for future growth in net investment income. This improvement was evident in our investment income attributable to the fixed maturity portfolio, which grew 13.3% quarter-over-quarter to $346 million. Partially offsetting this growth in the Q4 of 2025 was investment fund losses of $32 million, bringing our overall pre-tax net investment income to $338 million. The credit quality of the investment portfolio remains very strong at AA-, while the duration of our fixed maturity portfolio, including cash and cash equivalents, increased to 3 years.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

As a reminder, the duration was 2.6 years as of year-end 2024 and has been increasing throughout 2025, yet remains shorter than the average life of our liabilities. The effective tax rate in the Q4 was 20.5% and benefited from a lower effective tax rate relating to foreign earnings and the utilization of foreign tax credits. We expect the annual expected effective tax rate will approximate 23% for the full year of 2026. Turning to capital management, we returned $608 million of capital to investors in the Q4, comprising special and regular dividends of $412 million and share repurchases of $196 million.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Earlier in the year, we returned an additional $363 million, made up of dividends and share repurchases, bringing the total for the year to $971 million. Besides returning more than 10% of stockholders' equity to investors, we grew stockholders' equity by 15.6%. We continue to thoughtfully manage our capital position, which is further evident by our historically low financial leverage ratio of 22.6%, with the next scheduled maturity in 2037.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

In summary, 2025 was an outstanding year with record top line, both gross and net premiums written of $15.1 billion and $12.7 billion, respectively, underwriting income of $1.2 billion, net investment income of $1.4 billion, operating income of $1.7 billion, and net income of $1.8 billion. These record results culminated in growth in book value per share before and after dividends and share repurchases of 26.7% and 16.4%, respectively. Rob, I'll stop there and pass it back to you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

All right, thanks, Richie. That's tough to follow. So just a couple of more soundbites and, as promised, on to the Q&A. Regarding the top line, first off, unpacking that a little bit for folks, I think it's worth noting that October and November, from a growth perspective, were particularly disappointing. I would call it flat-ish. And December, I don't have the net number in front of me, I left it down in my office, unfortunately. But the net and the growth tracked pretty closely, and the GWP was up 7% in December. So I would caution people not to leap to the conclusion that what you saw for the quarter is the new reality. I think it is quite the contrary, in all likelihood.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

To that end, early returns on January, again, we haven't even gotten to the end of the month, but we are seeing some encouraging signs as it relates to the top line there. You would have seen the rate ex comp just a little bit over 7%. I would tell you that they're, given what we are seeing in some of the more recent years, granted it's early, but how they seem to be developing out, we are not feeling across the board the same level of pressure to keep pushing on rate. I think we will continue to be diligent. We will continue to stay on top of it. We are not interested in our margins eroding, but we think that we're in a pretty good place, and we are looking at that carefully.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

The expense ratio, again, I'm not going to do a deeper dive on that. Rich touched on it already, but I would tell you that the 28.2, excuse me, very comfortable number. That having been said, we are going to be making some pretty meaningful investments. Some we've already made, but we're going to be leaning into it a bit harder, both on the tech side and the broader banner, both data, AI, et cetera, and that will come as a price, but we're confident that these are going to be investments that generate very good returns. I think one of the things that's worth noting about this organization, and it's something that we talk about from time to time, is the consistency of the results. We are not an organization that looks to have a lumpy performance.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We are an organization that is very focused on hitting base hits every day, consistently. From our experience, assuming that one of the leading goals is to build book value through making a good underwriting margin, we look to manage volatility through thick and thin. So we are very pleased with the results that we've delivered in the quarter and the year. But again, part of what distinguishes us is the consistency of those results. Rich talked about the investment portfolio. I would just highlight that the AA- is teetering on almost becoming a AA.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

In addition to that, yes, while we have pushed the duration out to 3.0, neutral for us is probably closer to just inside of 4 if you look at the average duration of our loss reserve, or I should say, the average life of our loss reserves. Still room, if you compare what's rolling off the portfolio over the foreseeable, call it, give or take 4-6 is coming off, and we're still able to put money to work, you call it 5. So when you look at the situation, the business is really firing on all cylinders. We're generating very strong returns. We already had a surplus, even after the capital management of capital, that would be measured in 10 figures.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Quite frankly, given the returns and the market conditions, while we would love to have an opportunity to put the capital to work, right now, we're generating capital more quickly, and we can utilize it, and you should expect us to continue to look for thoughtful ways to return the excess capital to those that it belongs, that being our shareholders. I will pause there, and, Kevin, at this time, if we could please open it up for questions.

Operator

We will now begin the question-and-answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question, please raise your hand now. If you have dialed in to today's call, please press star nine to raise your hand, star six to unmute. Please stand by as we compile the Q&A roster.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Kevin, you run a tight ship. One question per person. All right. We'll see if anybody pays attention.

Operator

Your first question comes from the line of Elyse Greenspan with Wells Fargo. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, Elyse. Good afternoon.

Elyse Greenspan
Elyse Greenspan
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Wells Fargo

Hi, thanks. Good evening. I thought he said one question and one follow-up, but we'll see. I guess my first question was, just in terms of premium growth, Rob, I appreciate the color on October, November, and then also on January. But just given your view of the market, right? You know, just the growth you saw in the quarter, I think you also said, right, that there is probably perhaps less of a need to continue to push for the same amount of price. How are you seeing this all translating into premium growth, I guess? Would your expectation that 2026 is better than the Q4, maybe weaker than the full year, 2025? How does this all come together in your mind?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think it's likely that the insurance activities will, both primary and perhaps and excess, will likely do better than what the total number was in the Q4. I think that the reinsurance marketplace, you know, some version of history may be repeating itself. A little early to declare that, but it would seem like the table is being set.

Elyse Greenspan
Elyse Greenspan
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Wells Fargo

And then I guess, my second question is on the expense ratio. You guys guided to, you know, comfortably below 30% in 2026. It sounds like 2026, based on commentary, you described it like an investment year. If, you know, saying that correctly, you can correct me if I'm wrong. So would you expect, like, the AI and the tech type investments, I guess, would be higher in 2026, and then we start to see a return on those investments in 2027, or how are you thinking through the moving pieces there?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think it's exactly what Rich and I alluded to, that we are going to be making meaningful investments in 2026, and I expect we will continue to make meaningful investments in 2027. I mean, this space, and it's in part what I was alluding to earlier in the call, Elise, I just did it in a very clumsy way, was that, you know, this is a trajectory of how the tools are coming to be available and how we as an organization are adopting them, and it's not a one and done. This is just an ongoing process. So do I think that when are the benefits going to show up? I would like to think that we're going to start to see benefits certainly in 2027, and I think it will scale from there.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

but it's going to—it certainly does take some time because, you know, it, it's not just you, you drop it in, it's a, a more complicated process than that.

Elyse Greenspan
Elyse Greenspan
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Wells Fargo

Thank you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thanks for the question. Have a good evening. Thanks for the question. Have a good evening.

Operator

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Tracy Benguigui with Wolfe Research. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, Tracy. Good evening.

Tracy Benguigui
Tracy Benguigui
Director and Senior Research Analyst at Wolfe Research

Hey, good evening. You know, I always appreciate hearing your market commentary. You sounded a tad more constructive on workers' comp. You were mentioning that while it's not rosy now, California's coming to grips. But if we zoom out of California, one of the large brokers had said at their investor day that medical inflation is rampant, and it'll show up in rate. Are you seeing something similar? And can you also comment about the reduction in premiums just in 4Q, if that was largely exposure-based?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, so, a couple of things there. First off, as far as medical trends and how that ties in with severity, I think that's something that we've been talking about at least as long as we've been talking about auto liability. I think it's finally coming into focus for many. You know, from our perspective, we think the medical costs and just, quite frankly, claims activity in general within the space of workers' comp has been somewhat artificially suppressed because of how it gets the benefits get priced, and the reimbursement gets priced in many, many states. Regarding our growth in the quarter, it was primarily exposure based, where we just there were certain pockets where we didn't see the opportunity at those rates.

Tracy Benguigui
Tracy Benguigui
Director and Senior Research Analyst at Wolfe Research

Got it. Also in your press release, you were talking about exceeding 15% ROE, and I think the 15% is not new. That's a longer-term goal throughout the cycle. Consensus estimates are well above that. How should we think about a nearer-term ROE, given your comments about returning excess capital?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think that we believe that the company is firing on all cylinders at the moment, and we got a lot of momentum, and that momentum is both on the underwriting side as well as the investment side. So I can't promise you that the return will be this or that, but I can tell you that just the nature of the business, barring the unforeseen event, you know, to a great extent, 26 is almost the results. Again, barring the unforeseen event, they're kind of cooked, right? Because of how the premium earns through and the way the investment portfolio unfolds.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So again, I can't sit here and promise you what a return will be, but barring the unforeseen event, it's not that hard to connect the dots that it should be another very good year, and with every passing day, we're setting the table for 2027.

Tracy Benguigui
Tracy Benguigui
Director and Senior Research Analyst at Wolfe Research

Thank you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from David Motemaden with Evercore. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, David. Good evening.

Operator

You may have to-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

David?

Operator

Unmute yourself from your end, David.

David Motemaden
David Motemaden
Senior Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Evercore ISI

Hey, sorry, guys. Can you guys hear me now?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, thank you.

David Motemaden
David Motemaden
Senior Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Evercore ISI

Yeah, sorry about that. Just wanted to just go back just on the PYD, and so it looks like a little bit under $11 million in insurance of adverse, offset by about $13 million of favorable in reinsurance. Could you just talk a little bit about what was driving the adverse on the insurance side? Any different accident years you know you would point to? Just sort of keeping in mind your comment, Rob, on maybe not seeing the same level of pressure to keep pushing on rate. Just want-- trying to understand that, given what's going on on the PYD side in the insurance business.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah. So, if you don't mind, maybe... I don't have the answers in front of me, just because in the scheme of $18-point-something billion of reserves, I didn't do a deep dive on the $11 million. But if you wouldn't mind, we'll have Karen and or Rich follow up with you tomorrow, and we'll get you all the detail that we're able to.

David Motemaden
David Motemaden
Senior Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Evercore ISI

Got it. Okay, that'd be great. And then also, just trying to get the right jump-off point on the expense ratio. Rich, I think you mentioned a non-recurring benefit for commission-related accruals that helped the expense ratio this quarter. Could you just size that benefit?

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sure. That was about 30 basis points impact on the expense ratio.

David Motemaden
David Motemaden
Senior Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Evercore ISI

Great. Thank you.

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

You're welcome.

Operator

Your next question comes from Bob Huang with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, Bob. Good evening.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Good evening. Thank you for just the detailed commentaries there. Maybe just a follow-up on pricing and what you said about pricing trend and casualty. I understand that some lines are softening, but you... Are there any lines of business right now where you feel within casualty, where you feel the pricing trend is beginning to not make sense anymore? In other words, are there any lines of business where you feel like you might need to start cutting exposure as we go forward into 2026 and 2027?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, I mean, Auto Liability would be one where if you look at what our top line is, and relative to our rate, we are clearly shrinking the business from an exposure perspective. So that would probably be a leading example.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Got it. And then in other businesses, you don't feel the other lines of business are as bad or as obvious. Is that a fair statement?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We certainly have some concerns and reservations about some of the professional lines that I alluded to earlier. And I think that also we don't do a lot of it, so, you know, it doesn't really move the needle for us in a huge way. But the large account property stuff, the shared and layered stuff, you know, we're... That's getting pretty tight.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Got it. I really appreciate that. Thank you. My-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sure.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

My follow-up is, your, the next stage of the AI growth. This is very clear that you're really leaning into the capabilities here. I think previously you've talked about, early stage of the hybrid model, where both a group-wide and individual tools can be implemented, and then that's been. Like, are there any things going into, rest of the year and next year where you feel, that are somewhat of a low-hanging fruit, where the, the, the payoff realization can happen relatively quickly? Or are there any specific capabilities you feel that are more, closer to reality, in today's environment, that, that gets you really excited?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think probably what is underway now, if we focus on the underwriting side, we can talk about claims separately, but on the underwriting side, what's here and now and happening is on the intake side, where we are able to utilize certain technologies, and they are enabling us to increase our efficiency dramatically. So we are able to get to more business, and we are able to effectively prioritize.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Got it. Really appreciate the color. Thank you very much.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Oh, yeah, so differently, people's time is utilized much more effectively.

Bob Huang
Bob Huang
Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley

Okay. Got it. Thank you. Really appreciate the time. Thank you very much.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from Brian Meredith of UBS. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hey, Brian. Good evening.

Operator

A reminder to unmute yourself, Brian.

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

There we go. Now I'm unmuted. Evening, Rob. So two questions here. First, Rob, I wanted to dive into your comment about maybe laying off rate a little bit, but keeping margins, I think is what you also said, and I'm wondering if that implies you to think that trend is starting to moderate some here, and then as we look into 2026, that maybe loss picks are kind of stable then, if you don't want margins to deteriorate.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So my take on that is it's premature to reach any conclusions with confidence, but some of the activity or that we are seeing, or lack of activity in some of the more recent years, would suggest that we're in a comfortable place. I think as we've discussed in the past, Brian, you know, a trend is a moving target, so I don't think it's that we take our foot off the pedal, but maybe the foot doesn't have to be stepping down on the pedal quite as hard, selectively.

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

Gotcha. And then just with respect to loss rates or loss, you know, loss picks?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, sir. I'm sorry, I didn't hear you. I beg your pardon?

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

No, I mean, with respect to your kind of jumping off point here with respect to loss picks, if you're going to keep margins stable, and it sounds like your expense ratio is going to be flatted up a little bit, it would imply that loss ratio is going to be pretty stable too.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We are looking to preserve our margins to the best of our ability, as long as the market will allow us to, and right now, we think we can do that.

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

That's, that's great.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Certainly more easily to the insurance business. I think the reinsurance marketplace is probably going to become more challenged more quickly-

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

Yeah

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

-in general.

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

That makes sense. And then just quickly going back to your comments about distribution competing with you a little bit now, and customers want simplicity. Does that mean that, you know, perhaps you may lean into a little bit more utilizing MGAs and/or buying MGAs, and that maybe that's a quicker way to kind of get to where you want to get to with respect to distribution?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

No. The short answer is, I don't think we're going to necessarily be leaning into or acquiring. Generally speaking, I think as we've tortured you all in the past, we have a real caution around delegated authority, and quite frankly, the valuations of some of these businesses we think have gotten to the point where oftentimes it's irrational. And you know, there's a lot of private equity money still trying to figure out, you know, how they're going to make it all work. But in the meantime, we're pleased to continue to partner with traditional distribution. But I think the point is, it's not lost on us that some of the traditional distribution is looking to have the pen or in some ways, have a different relationship with capital. We're aware of that.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We are responding to it, and it also means that we're thinking about distribution maybe a little bit in a way that we wouldn't have thought about it five years ago.

Brian Meredith
Brian Meredith
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS

Makes sense. Thank you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

... Thanks, Brian. Have a good evening.

Operator

Your next question comes from Alex Scott of Barclays. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, Alex. Good evening.

Operator

A reminder to unmute yourself on your end, Alex. Star six if you're on the phone.

Alex Scott
Alex Scott
Equity Research Analyst at Barclays

Hey, sorry about that. All right, so first one I had for you is just to follow up on the technology improvements you're working on. How would you characterize the way you're thinking about that over the medium term? Is that something that as you bring the expense ratio down, some of it can drop to the bottom line? Or is this something that is going to potentially just, you know, help to make you more competitive? You might be able to, you know, give back on price a little bit, get a little more competitive and improve growth. I'd just be interested in how you're approaching those investments.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think the answer is all of the above. I mean, ultimately, we certainly are looking to have efficiency and savings, and how much of that we hold on to versus how much gets passed on to the customer, in part, depends on the marketplace and, quite frankly, competitors, what they are doing and what kind of efficiencies they're capturing and what they're passing on to customer. So look, when the day is all done, I appreciate that a lot of the focus may be around pricing and margin, but I would suggest to you that a lot of these tools, it's not just about dollars saved, it's also about value creation. I think that that's an additional way to consider these tools, how they will be incorporated, and how they will impact the business that the three of us work for.

Alex Scott
Alex Scott
Equity Research Analyst at Barclays

That's helpful. Thanks. And, you know, I guess just, just looking at the growth and thinking about increased competition, I was just interested if you could talk about, to any degree, you're seeing a flow back into admitted at this point. Like, is that something that's affecting the growth rate at all, or is it more just competition within the E&S market?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I would tell you, in the very, very small end of town, as far as account size, you might see a standard market slip in there a little bit, but by and large, they are, for the most part, for the moment, staying within their swim lane. That having been said, national carriers in particular, but some of the regional carriers on the standard side, within their swim lane, they are being remarkably aggressive at this stage of the game.

Alex Scott
Alex Scott
Equity Research Analyst at Barclays

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from Rob Cox with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, Rob. Good evening.

Rob Cox
Rob Cox
VP and Equity Research Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Hey, thanks for the evening.

Rob Cox
Rob Cox
VP and Equity Research Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Rob, good evening.

Rob Cox
Rob Cox
VP and Equity Research Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Yes. Yeah, first question. Could you just unpack some of your comments on the property cat environment leaking into casualty dynamics a bit? I'm just curious how, how that is playing out, how meaningful you think it is, and if you think the, the strong net investment income contributions are contributing to that as well.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

The answer is, I think we'll know more when we all have an opportunity to reflect on Q1 and see who did what. But my sense is that, again, you got a lot of people that have a lot of capital, and they feel pressure to put it to work, and they're trying to hit budgets and so on. And as a result of that, when the premium is coming in short on the property cat, they're looking to try and figure out what other levers they can pull. And casualty would appear to be one of them, or a liability, including the professional. So, you know, we'll, we'll have to see over time. Do I think investment income is a component of it? Yeah, probably. Can I quantify for you how much is one versus the other?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

No, not with any confidence, but I, I do think that... I think that one, one proved to be more competitive, and from our perspective, it seemed to spill over into the casualty lines more than we would have anticipated. Now, having said that, you know, we buy a lot of reinsurance, and that's not a bad thing for us. Where we assume, you know, we'll, we'll deal with it just as we have in the past. Our colleagues are interested in making money, not writing business.

Rob Cox
Rob Cox
VP and Equity Research Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Thanks for all that color, Rob. That's helpful. So follow up on, you know, home insurance. I think you mentioned Berkley One is one of the good places to grow right now, where you see some opportunity. Curious of your views on the excess profit discussions from regulators and particularly the New York state with regards to the two-year look back. Is that something you think is rational, and do you have any views on the rationality of that?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think that regulators tend to focus on a moment in time, and I think that they need to look at historical results, particularly given the volatility that exists in the homeowners line in particular. I think that as far as Berkley One goes, it's less high on a regulator's radar screen, perhaps because, for the most part, regulators don't give a shit about rich people.... Thanks.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Yaron Kinar with Mizuho. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Thank you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Good evening.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Can you hear me?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, we can.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Great. Thanks for, for taking my questions here. In, in insurance, I'm trying to connect the dots. Sounds like the slowdown in premiums in October, November was more driven by increased competition. And yet, I, I think you're still cautioning not to, read too much into that. Is that because you see competition flattening out here, or are you seeing greater appetite emerging for, for the company itself to go after more premiums?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think the point that we were trying to make is that a couple of fold. One is that October and November are just two months, and we would... While they sort of shine brightly through in a quarter, we would caution people to latching onto that too much, particularly given the data point of December and what we are seeing in January. In addition to that, we offered the comment earlier that from our perspective, there are certain pockets of our portfolio, certain parts of the market, where, given the early returns on the reserves, we are thinking that perhaps there is, it is a more comfortable place than we appreciated.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Okay. Thank you. And then I had another question on the tech investments here, specifically on the AI side, machine learning. I've always thought of that as being very data-driven, and I, I'm just trying to think how this plays out in a company that has always prided itself in having 50 different operating units, plus, minus. How do you consolidate that or run that efficiently and have the data to apply across the 50 units?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Just, just because we have more than 60 different businesses doesn't mean that we're not able to aggregate and use the data among the businesses and make it available to the businesses within the group. So I think the notion, perhaps, that you had, that each one is a self-contained island, and there is no way for them to work together on things such as data, or for us to aggregate, or for us to build tools and try and leverage them across the broader organization, I would encourage you to maybe think about that a little differently.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Yeah, maybe we can take this offline. I'm trying to understand kind of the how more than the concept of whether you can.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sure. Yeah.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Okay. Thank you.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We would be very happy to try and give you a little more color. Please just call at your convenience.

Yaron Kinar
Yaron Kinar
Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho

Appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sure.

Operator

Your next question comes from Andrew Kligerman with T.DCowen. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Great. Can you hear me?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, sir, we can.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Oh, sure.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Good evening.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Rob, I'd like to, on the premium question, in the past, you've, you know, let's say going back two years ago, your outlook was for double-digit. More recently, you had talked about 8% to 10% for the year. Maybe big picture, how are you thinking about 2026 in terms of growth potential? Cause of those, you know, kind of disparities between October, November versus December and January. What are you thinking this year?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I'm thinking that I don't get rewarded for providing estimates and these kind of forward-looking statements. That having been said, you know, from, from my perspective, as mentioned earlier, I think the insurance business, both excess and primary, should have an opportunity to grow more than what you saw us do in the quarter. And as I suggested, I think the reinsurance business, while we remain optimistic, we are even more so disciplined, and we can't control the market. So we'll have to see how that unfolds, but that seems to be becoming more challenging more quickly.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Very fair.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

At least from my view.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Fair enough, Rob. And then maybe just drilling into detail, as I look at the net written premium, it looked like short tail lines grew a little more than the others. Could you share with us which areas of short tail that worked out well? And then-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, the big drivers there are A&H, as well as our private client business, Berkley One.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

I see. And then just-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

If you look at the commercial lines piece. The commercial lines piece is not where it's coming from at all.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Got it. That makes a lot of sense. And then just the workers' comp piece you touched on, I guess it sounded like you were writing fewer accounts cause you didn't get the rate you wanted. This was an area about a year ago, there was some excitement, just higher risk stuff. So maybe just a little color on what you're seeing.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, I think-

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Yeah.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, we tried to bifurcate the fact, Andrew, that there's sort of the more complex, higher hazard, as you alluded to, versus the Main Street stuff. I think the other piece with this, there was not a huge amount, but there was a bit of a timing issue with this as well. Richie, you want to talk about that for a minute?

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

... Sure. So, we had a couple of our operations, if you will, that renewals had transpired at different time periods, relative to the Q4 of this year. So, that was the other reason for the change from, you know, the decline, if you will, in the workers' comp space.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Oh, I see. So that might reverse a little bit in the next quarter?

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Over time, yes, that's the expectation.

Andrew Kligerman
Andrew Kligerman
Managing Director at TD Cowen

Got it. Thanks a lot!

Rich Baio
CFO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thank you.

Operator

And your next question comes from Josh Shanker at Bank of America. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Yeah, thank you for letting me in.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hey, Josh. Good evening.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

How are y'all doing there?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We're doing okay, thanks. Hopefully, you're well.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Good, thank you. Thank you. So, you know, when you're thinking about pricing business, sometimes you imagine that you need a certain amount of rate because loss costs rise at a certain trajectory. Sometimes you need rate because the loss cost trend has changed, and therefore, the way you were pricing it previously needed some correction. As you talk about the softening-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Right

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

... we're not really seeing you or any competitors out there really talk about a different loss pick, and we're not even seeing it in the paid loss trends, although we haven't seen the Q4 triangles yet. Are loss conditions changing beneath the industry's feet right now, or is the industry unable to get the necessary price increases with the general trajectory that one would expect from where losses are supposed to go?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Was there a particular part of the market that you were focusing on or just in general?

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

I mean, when you say something like casualty, that's a very broad, that's a very broad class, right? There's a lot of different kinds of casualty out there. So I guess, I mean, we can start broad, but maybe there's something specific going on that you want to highlight.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Okay, so here are a couple of sound bites, and if I'm missing the mark, you'll please tell me. But I, I would tell you that in the excess and umbrella space, it seems like, there is a reasonable amount of discipline and trend continues, and we and others are, are getting that. I think auto liability, as we discussed earlier, continues to be a problem, and the marketplace is taking rate, though I'm not convinced at this stage that it's enough. As far as property goes, people have super short memories, and the notion of making sure you have an appropriate cat load, I think is a, a fading concept. You want me to keep going or is that enough?

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Well, I'm just— What I'm hearing from you is rate doesn't feel enough. You're not seeing paid trends change in such a way that demand a different view. It's just like, look, things are going at a pace we understand, and we're not getting the rate for it, I guess.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think what I'm suggesting is, Josh, that different product lines are in different places, and you need to use a pretty fine brush, in my opinion. I think that there are certain product lines where I would tell you there's a green light, and it would be advisable to try and lean into it more. There are certain that are amber, and there are some that are red. And ultimately, it's, you know, one makes a judgment as to what do you believe the loss pick is, given what you're able to charge? How do you feel about that, and what is your confidence in that? And every day, we go through that process. Obviously, there are certain characteristics, such as length of incurred tail, that can make it that much more complicated.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So I would tell you that from my perspective, there are certain product lines where, again, per the comment I made earlier about rate, where we're feeling as though, you know what? We're in a pretty good place. Maybe we don't need to be pushing quite so hard on rate. There are other places where we are dead serious about the rate that we need, and if the choice is you write it, if you don't get, or get the rate or not, if you don't get the rate, don't write it. That's why you see certain parts of our business, exposure-wise, shrinking. So it's very difficult to have a one-size-fits-all, but philosophically, that's how we think about the business, I don't know, for like 50 years, and we're still thinking about it that way.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Are there parts of the market that are earning, let's say, a 91% to 94% combined ratio that you could write and you could grow, but that's not good enough? Or are there not these pockets that are worse than your 89 or 87, depending on how you want to call it, but it's just not out there to be found.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Maybe to answer the question a little differently, please understand, we are a return-driven business, not a combined-ratio-driven business. We figure out what type of combined we need in order to achieve the return.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Okay, and so there's not, like, pockets that just are marginally attractive. I mean, the 2% growth, it's not terrific given what we're used to, but that just—there might be nothing out there for you, I guess.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I, I think that the answer is that there are different parts of the market that are at different places in the cycle, and my colleagues, to their credit, understand very clearly what the goal of the exercise is: to make money, make good returns, not to issue insurance policies…. There are certain product lines that are in a moment of transition. In fact, all product lines are in some sense of transition, but some more than others. We are navigating and responding to market conditions and also responding to the data that we have as to how we see the margins that currently we are in place.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

Well, thank you for indulging my questions.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thank you, Josh. Have a good evening.

Josh Shanker
Josh Shanker
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America

You too.

Operator

Your next question comes from Meyer Shields of KBW. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Great. Thanks so much. I just wanted to confirm that you can hear me.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, sir. Good evening.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Oh, fantastic. Hi, Rob. How are you?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

How are you?

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

You mentioned, Good, thank you. I just want to go back to the comments where you talked about how reevaluating recent accident years suggests less of a need to push for rate. I know in the past, we've talked about some claims made, claim frequency coming in below expectations, and that's actually translated into some reserve releases for lines of business where the claims didn't happen. Is that what you're talking about? Is this the same subject?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So it's really across the board, where even where there is some tail to it, and, you know, we have tail factors and how we would expect it to develop, that there are certain early indications that in some of the more recent years, that even the lines that have some tail to it, it would seem as though the underwriting actions and the rate actions are having the impact plus that we had hoped for.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Okay, no, that, that's very helpful. Is there any way of-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

It's not-

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Breaking down?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Just to give you a little bit more, it is not limited to the claims-made form. So again, we're not going to get ahead of ourselves, but we're watching it.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Okay. No, that's helpful. I was wondering if there's a way of breaking down whether that's positive emergence on the frequency side or on the severity side?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I would invite you to give Rich a call, and he can torture you with all kinds of data.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Okay, I look forward to it. Last question. Does any of that initial or changing viewpoint impact the full year 25 accident or loss picks for the relevant lines?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sorry, could you once more? I beg your pardon there.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Yeah. So let me rephrase it. If there's more optimism about how these recent years are going, did that show up in the accident year 25 loss picks for the exposed lines, or did you maintain the loss picks and then just feel less need for pricing?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

No, we did not touch them.

Meyer Shields
Meyer Shields
Managing Director at KBW

Okay, perfect. That is what I wanted to hear. I really appreciate it.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, sir.

Operator

And your next question comes from Katie Sakys of Autonomous Research. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Hi, good evening.

Katie Sakys
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Autonomous Research

Hi, thank you. Just a quick one from me. I just kind of wanted to break down your philosophy on capital return going into the new year here. You know, I think the size of the buyback this quarter was perhaps a bit higher than expected in the context of some of your commentary last quarter. Was-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

What did I say last quarter?

Katie Sakys
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Autonomous Research

I think you had kind of phrased it as not necessarily seeing like a huge opportunity for buyback, and I recognize that can, you know, change over time. So would you say that the 4Q repurchase was opportunistic, or do you anticipate continuing to repurchase at these higher levels as long as you continue to access more capital than you feel you can put to work?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Okay, well, I have good news for you. The gentleman who is the head of our repurchase desk and also the head of our capital management committee, and I don't know, you probably have some other fancy titles. Do you want to take that one?

Bill Berkley
Bill Berkley
Chairman at W. R. Berkley Corporation

Sure. I think that, we're constantly looking what to do with our excess capital, how much we generate it, and how much we can use for various things in our business. So it's really constantly changing opportunity. When the opportunity arose, we took advantage of it. I can't tell you how and what we'll do tomorrow or the next day. We think that, our business is returning 20%+ on capital, which candidly, I'm optimistic that we'll continue to be able to do that at the moment. It's a pretty good investment from my point of view, so, I would expect that we'll continue to look if opportunities present themselves to buy back stock. The alternative is give stock, give money back to our shareholders in special dividends. But you know, I don't think we have a rule.

Bill Berkley
Bill Berkley
Chairman at W. R. Berkley Corporation

The judgment as we move through the year and as we look at opportunities and what we're going to do, we still had a huge amount of excess capital that we generated. One of the things people don't understand is we've become a very much more financially conservative company. We've gone from 35% debt to equity to 22% debt to equity. We've got lots of capacity to do lots of things, and that gives us a lot of flexibility. It's not just the cash we generate, it's the balance sheet we have, the risk we have inherent in running the business. We look at the opportunities with those things together, and we're a very much more conservative company.

Bill Berkley
Bill Berkley
Chairman at W. R. Berkley Corporation

... So I can't give you an answer, but I can tell you where we have lots of opportunities, and, you know, our job is to run the business as though we own the whole thing, and how would we use our capital most effectively for the owners of the business? And we'll make that decision on a constantly evolving and changing basis.

Katie Sakys
Senior Equity Research Analyst at Autonomous Research

Thank you very much.

Operator

Your next question comes from Ryan Tunis of Cantor. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Yeah.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Good evening, Ryan.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Hey, good evening, Rob.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yes, good time.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Yeah, so first question, just on the investment fund returns, been a bit mixed. Just curious if maybe we go into a little bit more detail there. Is that individual fund specific? Just, I don't know, peel back the onion a little bit on what's going on with the invested funds.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Long story short, the noise that you saw in the financial category was primarily driven by one fund, and it has, you know, it was a disappointing result, and quite frankly, it's been a disappointing relationship.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Well, okay.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We do not expect that to be the norm going forward.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Sure. Okay. And then, I guess just a follow-up, yeah, I get here in the aftermarket, a few of these managed care companies like UNH are getting woodshedded. These stocks on Medicare Advantage, a CMS proposal on 2027 rate increases of supposedly just being flat. Apparently, they need more than that. If memory serves, workers' comp pricing is, has some relationship to these Medicare price indications. I don't exactly remember how that works. Maybe you could-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

So yeah-

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Refresh my memory?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

... workers' comp rates, yeah, workers' comp rates in several states price off of a multiple of. I think it's Medicare, not Medicaid, schedules. Not all, but in many. And I think we all know that Medicare, quite frankly, plays not just below market, but below cost. So comp has benefited from a multiple of that. Now, what you're starting to see happen, and you saw maybe a year, 18 months ago or something like that in Florida, and I think you're starting to see it in some other states, is where they are going back and reviewing what the multiple is, because the underlying Medicare rates are just so below market, that that is basically enriching the comp writers, and they're looking to adjust that. I think you're going to see that more and more.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I think, quite frankly, medical trend is going to prove to be a bigger and bigger challenge. Certainly, pharma is a piece of that, in spite of the efforts from the administration, and I think it's going to be not just pharma. So that's how we think about it, and hopefully, that's helpful as far as the relationship between comp and Medicare.

Ryan Tunis
Ryan Tunis
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor

Sure is. Thanks, guys.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Sure. Have a good evening. Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Mike Zaremski of BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Mike Zaremski
Mike Zaremski
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Hey, good evening.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Good evening.

Mike Zaremski
Mike Zaremski
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Yeah, evening. Thanks for fitting me in. Just kind of going back to the competitive environment and the insurance cycle, and you and Bill, Rob, have a lot of experience in terms of seeing a lot of past cycles. You know, I know you wouldn't say that based on your commentary, that's rational for casualty pricing to start decelerating, you know, given social inflation levels remain an issue. But I guess, but from just a, you know, as a competitor, though, have you seen this kind of cycle before that, you know, until there's real pain and, you know, ROEs start eroding off high levels, that, you know, the trajectory of casualty could be biased south a bit for the foreseeable future?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We're not seeing any. As far as GL or excess and umbrella, we are not seeing that. I think, you know, we've probably tortured the topic of auto liability enough, but as far, but as far as GL and the excess and umbrella, we're not seeing signs of what you're referring to.

Mike Zaremski
Mike Zaremski
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Okay, got-

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Will it come eventually? Yeah, absolutely. It's still a cyclical business. But is it here today? Certainly not as something that we're observing at the moment.

Mike Zaremski
Mike Zaremski
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Okay, got it. And, my follow-up is, Rob, in your prepared remarks when you were talking about kind of meeting the customer, where they, where, where it's most convenient for them, I guess I was initially thinking you were talking about direct to consumer, or direct to, you know, to, to business insurance online. But, and in your follow-up to a question later, you talked about just doing, different types of business with existing traditional insurance brokers. So I don't know if you're willing to just be more, add a little more color.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, maybe a little more. Yeah, a little more color. Sure, Mike. I think the point that we were trying to make is that the sacredness of the relationship between carrier and distribution is not universally sacred anymore. There's been a lot of change that has occurred, whether it be the nature of the ownership of the distribution, whether it be consolidation, whether it be distribution getting into the underwriting business. It's evolved. Simultaneously, you have a meaningful shift in customer behavior, and while perhaps it's not particularly pronounced amongst large accounts, in the small part of town, it is much more akin to personal lines.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

We, as an organization, are of the view in the end that we exist to serve the customer, and we are respectful of our partners, but we are going to meet the customer wherever she or he wishes to be met in the way they choose to be met. We certainly have businesses that are solely dedicated to wholesale. We certainly have businesses that are solely dedicated to retail. We also have businesses in the group that are going direct to customer. We have a new venture that is going to start to get its sea legs during 2026 called Berkley Embedded, where it's point of sale. There's a whole host of different things that we're doing, not looking to undermine partners, but making sure that we are there to meet the customer how she or he wishes to be met.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

What is becoming more and more apparent, I think I may have said this, if I didn't, my mistake, is that the customer, of course, they care about price. Almost every consumer does. But customers are more preoccupied with convenience, and they are more open to a self-serve model, and we need to be conscious of that and responsive to that.

Mike Zaremski
Mike Zaremski
Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets

Thank you.

Operator

Your final question comes from the line of Maxwell Fritscher with Truist Securities. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Good evening.

Maxwell Fritscher
Maxwell Fritscher
Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities

Hi, good evening. I'm on for Mark Hughes. In the other liability line, you mentioned a pivot in your portfolio last quarter. Where do you stand with that now? And then separately, how did pricing in that line trend through the quarter, maybe on a monthly basis, if you have that level of granularity?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

I honestly, maybe it's just the hour and a bit of a long day, but I do not have a clear recollection of what you suggested we said around a pivot and other liability last quarter. I'm sorry. Is there any additional context you could offer, please?

Maxwell Fritscher
Maxwell Fritscher
Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities

You had just mentioned that you were pivoting the portfolio, maybe you different states or, or, you know, exposures. So I just wanted to see if you had an update for us there.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Again, I apologize, it's not ringing a bell. Maybe we could pick this up offline, if you, if you don't mind, and we can sort of try and unpack it a little bit more as to what the context was, but it's not striking a chord.

Maxwell Fritscher
Maxwell Fritscher
Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities

Absolutely, that works. How about the pricing in other liability through the quarter, monthly? What did it accelerate, or how did you see that?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Yeah, we don't, we don't, generally speaking, break out that type of detail by product line, but as we suggested earlier on the liability side, we are feeling comfortable about where things are and how we see the market opportunity, at least at this moment.

Maxwell Fritscher
Maxwell Fritscher
Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities

Understood. And then separately on property, any stabilization there in pricing, or are you still seeing incremental pressure there?

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Well, I think as we suggested earlier, I think with the larger account stuff, we're seeing more than incremental pressure. Fortunately for us, that's not a big part of what we do. On the smaller property accounts, you know, quite frankly, we're still seeing opportunity there.

Maxwell Fritscher
Maxwell Fritscher
Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities

Great, thank you very much.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Thanks for the questions. Have a good evening, and again, if you wish to follow up on that, please just give us a shout, whenever you like. Kevin, was there anything else, or are we through?

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I'll now turn the call back to you, Mr. Rob Berkley, for closing remarks.

Rob Berkley
CEO at WR Berkley Corporation

Kevin, thank you very much for your hospitality this evening. Thank you to all participants for your time and your interest in the company. Again, I think, a solid quarter, to say the least, and yet another great year, and the momentum continues, for the most part, to be in our favor. So we look forward to catching up with you sometime in early April, and we wish you a good evening. Thank you again. Good night.

Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.

Analysts
    • Alex Scott
      Equity Research Analyst at Barclays
    • Andrew Kligerman
      Managing Director at TD Cowen
    • Bill Berkley
      Chairman at W. R. Berkley Corporation
    • Bob Huang
      Executive Director and Equity Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley
    • Brian Meredith
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at UBS
    • David Motemaden
      Senior Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Evercore ISI
    • Elyse Greenspan
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Wells Fargo
    • Josh Shanker
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bank of America
    • Katie Sakys
      Senior Equity Research Analyst at Autonomous Research
    • Maxwell Fritscher
      Equity Research Analyst at Truist Securities
    • Meyer Shields
      Managing Director at KBW
    • Mike Zaremski
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BMO Capital Markets
    • Rich Baio
      CFO at WR Berkley Corporation
    • Rob Berkley
      CEO at WR Berkley Corporation
    • Rob Cox
      VP and Equity Research Analyst at Goldman Sachs
    • Ryan Tunis
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at Cantor
    • Tracy Benguigui
      Director and Senior Research Analyst at Wolfe Research
    • Yaron Kinar
      Managing Director and Senior Equity Analyst at Mizuho
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