American International Group Inc. climbed after scoring an underwriting profit for a second straight quarter, a key goal for Chief Executive Officer Brian Duperreault in his effort to strengthen the insurer. It’s now concentrating on another phase of its turnaround plan.
“Given the progress we have made, we are now placing greater focus on a multiyear, enterprise-wide program,” Duperreault said Thursday on an earnings call. “The one thing we’ve never been noted for is operational excellence. And this is the one thing that we have not invested in. We’ve got legacy processes, too many manual interventions, on and on and on. It is a drag on our performance.”
Duperreault has sought to fix the company’s large property-casualty insurance business, which faced pressure over the years with higher-than-expected losses. The unit is on track to report an underwriting profit for the full year, he said, a sign of improving stability. For the next phase, the company will work to modernize all of AIG’s businesses and workflows, a move that’s “critical,” said Chief Operating Officer Peter Zaffino, who leads property-casualty operations.
AIG shares climbed 4.4% to $56.78 at 10:15 a.m. in New York, their biggest gain in intraday trading in three months. The company on Wednesday reported second-quarter earnings of $1.43 a share, beating the highest estimate among 17 analysts in a Bloomberg survey.
“This was the second consecutive quarter of better-than-anticipated results for AIG with particular signs of progress evident in the core general insurance segment,” Mark Dwelle, an analyst with RBC Capital Markets, said in a note to clients Wednesday. “We viewed the accident year loss ratio improvement in general insurance as encouraging and didn’t have the large losses or big cat events that have plagued the company for years,” he said, referring to major catastrophes.
With the insurer marking its 100th anniversary, it’s branding its modernization plan as AIG 200 “to look forward to the next 100,” Duperreault said.
Also in AIG’s second-quarter earnings:
Net investment income surged 19% to $3.7 billion on rising equity markets and a $142 million gain from the initial public offering of a holding in the private equity portfolio. AIG didn’t identify the company in its statement Wednesday.
The life and retirement businesses posted profit above $1 billion for the first time since the third quarter of 2017. The operations, coping with negative net flows, benefited from demand for fixed and indexed annuities and “strong” returns on private equity bets.
Mother Nature stung just slightly in the second quarter. Losses tied primarily to North American catastrophes totaled $174 million, net of reinsurance. AIG wasn’t alone: Travelers Cos. broke a streak of beating analyst estimates in the second quarter amid weather losses.