Well, the folks at RenaissanceRe (NYSE:RNR) have given me a rather thorough thrashing for my skepticism about how well this property/casualty reinsurer would do in the newly hard U.S. market. Not only did this company do one thing better than I thought it would, it did three things significantly better.
Right off the bat, for the first quarter, the company posted 13% growth in net premiums written, and that's a pretty strong result. And not only is RenaissanceRe writing a fair bit of business, the terms for U.S. catastrophe business have been very strong. And with a lot of business in Florida yet to write, and many companies unable or unwilling to get into the game, this could be a strong market indeed.
The company also did exceptionally well on its combined ratio for the quarter -- coming in at a bit less than 54 versus a bit more than 90 last year. Even realizing that year-ago results were hurt by a European windstorm, the 17.2 loss ratio in the catastrophe business strikes me as exceptional. One note here, though: Management at RenaissanceRe didn't go to the extent that some reinsurers have to talk about how it has changed its risk modeling after 2005's hurricane season. That's neither bad nor good, but rather just a tidbit I noticed.
The last part of the triple play was strong favorable reserve development and investment gains. Although these are sometimes excluded when evaluating performance, they still do matter. If an insurance company can do well with its investment portfolio, that's clearly a positive for the company and its shareholders (as we've all seen with Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRKa) (NYSE:BRKb)).
I was skeptical of RenaissanceRe largely because of the changes in management and concerns about its capital situation. I'm choking on those words a bit now. Now, all that said, I'm not radically changing my view of the stocks in the sector. I still think Arch Capital (NASDAQ:ACGL) is both pricey and promising, I think XL Capital (NYSE:XL) is an interesting turnaround opportunity, and I think Endurance Specialty (NYSE:ENH) is also worth a serious look.
As for RenaissanceRe . I have to admit that this is a stronger name than I initially assumed and there's probably money to be made here. Maybe not so much as with some of those other ideas, but if it really can exploit this hard market, who knows how much better it can do?
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Fool contributor Stephen Simpson has no financial interest in any stocks mentioned (that means he's neither long nor short the shares).
