Spain's Mapfre 9-month net profit surges on benign weather, higher prices (updated)

Mapfre SA

29/10/2024 08:18

(Adds details on combined ratio, writedowns in paragraphs 3-5)
       Oct 29 (Reuters) - Spain's largest insurer Mapfre
 MAP.MC  said on Tuesday its net profit rose 39% in first nine
months of the year as higher prices and more benign weather and
less severe natural disasters lifted its non-life business'
profitability.
    The firm's net profit jumped to 654 million euros ($803.80
million) on 21.62 billion euros in premiums.
    Non-Life combined ratio = the industry's key profitability
measure - has improved by 2 percentage points, settling at
94.8%. This favourable shift is attributed to premium increases
on insurance policies and fewer and less severe natural
disasters as a result of more benign weather. A devastating
earthquake in Turkey in early 2023 had cost the company more
than 100 million euros in the first half of last year.
    Mapfre also recorded a 90 million-euro accounting loss on
the writedown of the value of Verti Germany, its auto insurance
unit. 
    The company had already booked a 75 million euro writedown
on its car insurance business last year in the U.S. where prices
of cars and car parts were rising faster than insurance
premiums.
     ($1 = 0.9250 euros)

 (Reporting by Marta Serafinko and Natalia Siniawski, editing by
Inti Landauro and Tomasz Janowski)
 ((Marta.Serafinko@thomsonreuters.com; +48 58 769 66 00;))