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Hello Friends! A short work week but with plenty of big news. Hope everyone enjoyed Labor Day and is gearing up for ITC 2022 in two weeks. Nick Coenen and Dan Mets will be representing us, reach out and schedule time a meeting! This week we are following the Evolution of Home Insurance, Westfield’s step to becoming a Global Franchise and Corebridge Financial’s IPO: |
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The Evolution of Home Insurance We have seen the rise of smart home technology and security become an integral part of home insurance. It is not just a discount on your annual premium but a way to prevent losses. State Farm made a big splash this week announcing they would invest $1.2B in home security titan ADT. This equity position represents a 15% stake in the company and big strategic move for their home business. Hippo has been building their offering around this technology and had some interesting commentary at their investor conference this week. As the home business is challenged with loss costs, it makes sense to pivot to leveraging IoT and other smart home technology to prevent losses in the first place. |
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Westfield Buys Lloyd’s Syndicate Westfield has been transitioning from a Midwest company founded in 1847 by a group of farmers to a specialty company. In recent history they have made moves to diversify and made probably their biggest move this week acquiring Argo’s Lloyd’s Syndicate. Their CEO’s quote sums it up well “This acquisition is our first step in establishing a global franchise for Westfield,”. It was interesting to see this during a week in which AM Best starting to release their market segment reports. The surplus lines segment is a place of opportunity with record premiums. Having various platforms to capitalize risk will help them grow their share of the market in this segment to compliment their traditional business. |
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Corebridge Financial IPO AIG has been planning to spin off their life business and announced the launch of the IPO of the new entity, Corebridge Financial, Inc. It will begin to trade on the NYSE with the symbol “CRBG”. This will net a AIG a bundle of capital somewhere in the ballpark of $1.9B and follows similar moves by MetLife and Prudential to divest units and focus on core businesses. While it is impossible to time the market, this is only the 2nd IPO over $1B so far this year after the frenzy the past 2 years. Investors should be eager to jump into this fundamentally strong financial services concern. |
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