International General Insurance Holdings Ltd Aktie

Good day, and welcome to the International General Insurance Holdings Limited Second Quarter 2026 Financial Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions].

Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Robin Sidders, Head of Corporate Relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Liza, and good morning. Welcome to today's conference call. Today, we'll be discussing financial results for the second quarter and first half 2026. You will have seen the press release we issued after the market closed yesterday. And if you'd like a copy of it, it's on our website at www.iginsure.com. We've also posted a supplementary investor presentation, which can be found on our website in the Investor section on the main landing page.

On today's call are Executive Chairman of IGI, Wasef Jabsheh; President and CEO, Walid Jabsheh; and Chief Financial Officer, Pervez Rizvi.

As always, Wasef will begin the call with some high-level comments before handing over to Walid to talk through the key drivers of our results for the second quarter and first half and finish up with our views on market conditions and our outlook for the remainder of the year. At that point, we'll open the call up for Q&A. I'll just cover some customary safe harbor language to start with.

Our speakers' remarks may contain forward-looking statements. Some of the forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words. 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.

These forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Actual events or results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, including the risk factors set out in the company's annual report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2025, the company's reports on Form 6-K and other filings with the SEC as well as our results press release issued last evening.

We undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they are made. During this call, we will use certain non-GAAP financial measures. For a reconciliation of these measures to the nearest GAAP measure, please see our earnings release, which has been filed with the SEC and like I said, is available on our website.

With that, I'll turn the call over to our Executive Chairman, Wasef Jabsheh.

Thank you, Robin, and good day, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's call. IGI delivered excellent underwriting results, underlying results for both the second quarter and first half of 2026, and we continued to generate excellent returns for our shareholders.

We delivered these results against a backdrop of war and conflict in the Middle East, global uncertainty and a softening market environment. Market conditions are currently more challenging and pricing has continued to decline in many lines. The pace of decline was quite rapid in some areas. The war related losses that we experienced in the first half of 2026 are in aggregate likely to represent one of the largest net loss events in IGI history.

Our ability to withstand loss events of this scale and still achieve a very healthy level of profit clearly demonstrates the resilience, strength and stability we have at IGI and not only strength of our model, but the experience, focus and discipline of our people and the culture we have at IGI.

Our purpose is to provide peace of mind in times of uncertainty. We support clients across many countries in the region. And our relationships here are some of the longest in our history.

We are proud to be in a position of strength to support our clients and our people through these challenging times, not just in the Middle East, but across all our global markets. Our focus remains, as always, on risk-adjusted returns and active cycle management, no matter how volatile the world around us may be.

For us, our strategy of having a diversified portfolio allows us to be more resilient and have plenty of optionality. This is what drives the consistency in our long-term track record of high-quality financial results and shareholder value creation.

I will now hand over to Walid to discuss the numbers in more detail and talk about our outlook. And I will remain on the call for any questions at the end.

Thank you, Wasef. Good morning, everyone, and thank you all for joining us today. I'm also extremely pleased with our performance in Q2 and the first half of the year. In the face of sizable losses in one of our core regions, increasingly competitive market conditions and continued global uncertainty, our results clearly show that IGI is a strong, resilient and stable organization that can manage and mitigate volatility while continuing to execute our strategy and deliver excellent value for our stakeholders.

The events of the first half of the year were unusual, not only because of the scale of the war-related losses, but because it affected Middle East and countries that have generally been viewed as comparatively safe from this type of conflict-related impact. As Wasef noted, for IGI, the war losses in aggregate for the first six months of the year represent what's possibly the largest net loss event in IGI's history.

So, in many ways, this was a real-life stress test of our strategy, of our underwriting model, of our risk management of our balance sheet. And I'm very pleased though not really surprised that we performed so well and that our model and strategy was designed to perform.

I'd just like to make a few points before moving on to some of the specifics of the results for Q2 and H1. First, as we've already noted, the Middle East war-related losses in aggregate are likely to be looking like they'll be the largest single event loss in IGI's almost 25-year history now. We recorded net war losses in Q2 of almost $14 million, and for the first half of the first half, roughly $39 million, and that's both direct and indirect losses.

These losses are predominantly in our PV book. We mentioned in Q1 of an indirect loss in our energy portfolio. And these are war-related physical damage and business interruption losses and predominantly stem from our exposures in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and to a lesser extent, Oman.

As a reminder, and this should be fairly obvious, we don't have any exposure in countries that are sanctioned. Now the Middle East remains an important region for us served by our operations in both Oman and Dubai. As you're all aware, IGI originated in Jordan and the, of our 9 offices in Oman with almost 300 of our people and much of our operational support headquartered here. And it's where both Wasef and I are speaking to you from today.

That said, I mean, this is the first time we've experienced major war losses in the Middle East, and I'm proud that we're able to support our clients in the region. Consistent with our disciplined approach, we've used the insights gained from these events to further reduce PV line sizes and exposures. But on the flip side, and as I said on last quarter's call, we've also taken advantage of the price correction in the Middle East to write new business at significantly improved pricing.

Secondly, our ability to absorb shock losses was clearly demonstrated in the second quarter and half year financial results that we're discussing today. As I said at the outset, IGI today is a much larger, much stronger, more resilient and more stable company than even five years ago.

So again, to be able to record one of, if not the single largest loss in our history in the first 6 months of the year, while posting a 92% combined ratio, a $42.5 million profit and returning over $72 million in capital to shareholders really speaks for itself.

Lastly, and as we say this on most of these calls, we all know our business is very cyclical. But our view of success is never based on a quarter-to-quarter basis or even on a year-over-year basis. The market is constantly changing, but our philosophy and our values remain the same. Success for us, we've said many times in the past, is determined by long-term multiyear or over-the-cycle performance with some short-term volatility, which is the nature of our business and is in latent expected in our business as well.

Now I'll talk more about specific market opportunities and our entry into the Indian market just a little bit later during the call. But turning specifically to the results of Q2 and H1 of the year, I'll focus on a few key points and the drivers behind the numbers.

Now first, GWP was $201.7 million for Q2 and just under $400 million for the first half. This represents a 7.4% and 1.2% increase over the same period from last year. Now this primarily reflects the impact of around $10 million in new Indian business written subsequent to securing registration approval in June to open our office in GIFT City in India.

As I said, I'll say a few more words about that in a moment. Underwriting income was $29.5 million for Q2 and just over $67 million for the first half, which represents about a 6.7% increase over the first half of 2025. We posted a combined ratio of 95.1% for Q2. Now that included about 18.8 points of CAT losses, out of which 11 points are related to the war. That led to an ex-CAT accident year combined ratio of 74.9%, below the 76% posted for Q2 of last year.

Combined ratio of 92.2% for the first half included 19 points of CAT losses, out of which 12 points were related to the war itself. And that led to an ex-CAT accident year combined ratio of 86.2% compared to 84.1% for the first half of last year.

I'd note again that the additional indirect war losses recorded in the first half of around $10 million do not sit in the CAT line, and those amount to about an additional 4.5 points on the combined and loss ratios. Now these results really show the strength and profitability of our underlying performance even in the face of these adverse conditions and competitive market conditions as well.

Return on average equity was 12.6% and core operating return on average equity was 11.3% for the second quarter and then 12.3% and 12.5% for the first half, respectively. And these are broadly in line with our long-term averages.

Total value per share was $16.04 at the end of Q2 which includes total capital return to shareholders of about $73 million in the first half of the year. Now that's made up of almost $55 million in dividends, including the special dividend declared in March of $1.15 and a further $18.2 million in share repurchases.

Now those are the main highlights. I mean delving into the detail a little further. Net premiums earned were $125 million and $236.2 million for Q2 and H1 of the year, respectively. Those represented increases of 8.7% and 3.7%, respectively, over the same period last year. Combined ratio of 95.1% for Q2, as mentioned earlier, includes 18.8 points of CAT losses, mainly from the Middle East war and 1.4 points of unfavorable prior year reserve development, primarily related to our view of specific accounts or risks in our long-tail segment.

Although I note here that there is nothing systematic about this. Combined ratio of 92.2% for the first half of the year, again, as mentioned earlier, includes 19 points of CAT losses, again, primarily as a result of the war and 13 points of favorable prior year reserve development.

Now during Q2 and the first six months of the year, currency revaluation movements were not much of a feature really at all compared to the first half and second quarter of last year. So, all in, we delivered net income of just under $21 million or $0.49 per share for Q2 versus $34.1 million or $0.77 per share for Q2 of last year.

For the first six months, we delivered net income of $42.5 million or $0.98 versus $61.4 million or $1.36 per share for the same period last year.

Now specifically on to our Segment results. If we start with the short-tail. I mean, conditions continue to be very mixed in this segment with increases in some areas and decreases in others. But overall, written premiums were up in 2026 over both the second quarter and the first half of 2025, registering an increase of about 7% in Q2 over the same period last year.

For the first half, gross premiums in this segment were up just over 2%. Net premiums earned were down slightly at 3% for Q2 but were up just over 4% for the first half. Now rates remain generally adequate overall, but there is a whole lot of variation in the level of adequacy from one line to another.

Underwriting income for both Q2 and H1 was down substantially year-over-year due to the elevated level of loss activity, again, much related to the war, but still very healthy at $16 million for the second quarter and just over $25 million for the first half. And again, this really speaks about how we manage the risk or manage risk and the resilience we've built in our business.

If we move on to the Reinsurance Segment, conditions are increasingly competitive in the business that we write, and underwriting income was impacted by the higher level of losses in the quarter. GWP was up for the quarter, largely due to the new Indian business written mentioned before. Net premiums written were also up by just under 6% to just over $25 million.

For the first half, both gross written premiums and net earned premiums were down more so due to the nonrenewal of two sizable reinsurance programs in Q1, which we mentioned on last quarter's call.

In the long-tail segment, gross premiums written in Q2 were fairly steady with the same period in 2025. But on a net earned basis, premiums were up by over 33%, leading to an underwriting income of $5.5 million versus an underwriting loss of just under $3 million for Q2 of last year.

Similarly, for the first half, both gross written and net earned premiums were up 6.6% and 17.4%, driven by new business in most lines. Underwriting income for H1 increased substantially to just under $23 million versus an underwriting loss of just over $10 million for the same period in 2025.

Now we remain cautiously optimistic about market conditions stabilizing somewhat in this segment after many sequential years of declining rates. Now over the past few quarters, with much better data and more experience driven by more than a decade now of writing this business, we've taken the opportunity to assess this portfolio and our view of the sale and have made some very modest adjustments. Our approach to long-tail business is always on the side of conservatism. So any minor changes in our philosophy really just adds to that.

Consequently, the reserve strengthening you saw in our press release of modest $1.7 million or about 1.5 points in the combined ratio in Q2 was specific to this portfolio. Again, nothing systemic going on, purely us taking a more prudent view of the early years of this business. For the first half of '26, we released more than $30 million of prior year reserves across all our segments.

Now turning to the balance sheet. Total assets were just under $2.2 billion. Total investments in cash were just under $1.3 billion. Our allocation to fixed income securities, which makes up about 78% of our investments in cash portfolio, generated $14.5 million in the second quarter of investment income and $28.6 million in the first half. That's with a yield of 4.5% at the end of Q2, and we held duration steady at 3.5 years.

In Q2, we repurchased a little over 205,000 common shares average price per share of $24.82. At the end of Q2, we had 3.9 million common shares remaining under our existing $5 million common share repurchase authorization.

Total equity was just below $670 million at the end of the quarter, and that includes almost $73 million in share repurchases and common share dividends, including that special dividend I mentioned earlier. That compares to a total equity of about $710 million at the end of 2025.

So as I said at the outset, very strong fundamental results in Q2 and H1, especially considering the overall market softening and the heightened level of significant loss activity.

Before turning to our view and outlook of the market, I wanted to reiterate that IGI is a purely technical underwriting business. We generate returns through underwriting discipline, active capital management, cycle management. We don't rely on investment portfolio to support returns when the underwriting cycle softens.

Instead, our strategy relies on the significant diversification that we talk about all the time of our underwriting portfolio and our ability to execute through all market conditions and all stages of the market cycle. That's how we endure. And as we approach our 25th anniversary year, it's fair to say the strategy has served us well.

Now turning to opportunities and market conditions and starting with the Middle East. We've taken advantage of the significantly improved pricing and terms and grown our PV book by about 45% in Q2. Now the vast majority of this increase is down to significant pricing improvement, especially on the Middle East portfolio, but we've also written a lot of new business in these countries as well.

As always, we're being very selective in what we're willing to write. And as I said earlier, we've adjusted PV gross lines or gross line sizes leading to reduced exposure in the region, and that's a continuous process for us. On a positive note, we're definitely seeing more in the market there. Now we've said this before, our pricing correction has been long overdue in the PV line. And we're not only seeing that on a direct basis, but also on a reinsurance basis, albeit that's to a lesser extent. So, we're optimistic that the improved pricing and the policy structures will hold.

New opportunities in the Middle East are focused predominantly on PV and marine more lines and to a lesser extent, reinsurance.

Now to India. Now this is a whole sort of new market opportunity for us, one that we see as being long term in one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, and we're really excited about developing our presence there. In June, we announced that we secured registration approval for the setup of a branch office in GIFT City, which is India's first and only operational international financial services center.

So, we're currently in the process of setting up and staffing the office there. And this is a meaningful milestone for IGI as it expands our global footprint, strengthens our presence in the Indian subcontinent and furthers our diversification and our strategy of having physical presence with local talent in our key regions around the world. As I mentioned earlier, we've already written around $10 million of GWP of new Indian business and most of that predominantly in our treaty reinsurance book, which is mainly focused on specific niches like cyber and surety.

In other geographic regions, U.S., Europe, Asia Pac story is similar to what we said on prior calls, and we continue, as always, to leverage our presence, experience and relationships for new opportunities. I would add that we're working on a number of opportunities and initiatives that if and/or when they're in place will provide us with more noncorrelated diversified and profitable growth. And this is where the benefits of our upgrade from S&P last year to our full A really makes or can make a difference for us.

Now turning to specific lines of business, starting with the treaty reinsurance portfolio. Margins are still healthy, but competitive pressures are definitely becoming increasingly prevail. The opportunities here are more concentrated in specialty treaty lines like marine, energy, PV, tariff. And these are areas where there's been significant risk and wars. So we did see continued softening at 1.7.

What happens at 1.1, I mean, and whether we'll see that further pressure continue will really depend on the loss activity for the remainder of the year. In our long-tail segment, we're seeing some new opportunities and good deal flow, and we saw that in the first half of the year, especially in the more niche segments of the business-like marine liability. Now this is very clearly an opportunity for us to capitalize on improved pricing and demand for capital that resulted from the Baltimore bridge loss. So, we expect to grow and expand our direct marine liability book. Now we've already seen some of that in '26, and it's widely expected that renewal rates for the remainder of this year and into next year will continue to improve.

Moving to the short-tail portfolio. I've already covered PV. And as I said a moment ago, we're also seeing opportunities in certain marine lines like cargo, specifically cargo war and war on land arising from the conflict. While the opportunity so far isn't significant or as significant as we anticipated at this stage, we have taken advantage where appropriate.

Our energy book in certain areas of our property book, which are two of our largest lines are definitely much tougher than a year ago and even since the beginning of this year. We've seen those competitive pressures further increase to the point of being quite irrational in some cases. That said, we are cautiously holding out some optimism that we will see some steady in elements of our energy book, especially following some quite sizable losses and especially in the downstream energy space.

Now having said that, we continue to see relatively healthy conditions in the more specialist lines like construction engineering with healthy levels of deal flow, particularly with increase in infrastructure projects globally. I'd like to note though that in the Middle East, direct symptoms or results of war and general uncertainty, we are seeing some instances where projects are either being delayed and in some cases, canceled altogether.

And elsewhere in the portfolio continues, contingency continues to be a bright spot, which has been for many quarters now. So, there are opportunities out there even in the current environment. And this is where our strategy and our strengths matter most. Our significant diversification, the experience of our people and the relationship network provide us with a lot of optionality and several levers to work with. Our business continues to be very much a people business where relationships do matter.

So, we look forward to what's to come for the rest of this year and 2027, and we remain steadfastly focused on technical expertise and underwriting, strong execution of our strategy and capitalizing on the many opportunities that our strategy provides.

Our performance in the first half of 2026 tells a very clear story, more than $42 million in net income, healthy core margins, over $72 million returned to shareholders, a new operation launched in India. These results demonstrate clearly that even amid a softening market and extraordinary, unexpected loss events, this business continues to show real earnings power and genuine resilience.

This is the foundation we built on, and we remain committed to delivering peace of mind for our customers and superior value for our shareholders. So I'm going to pause here, and we're ready to turn it over for questions.

Operator, we're ready to take the first question, please.

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Rowland Mayor from RBC Capital Markets.

I wanted to quickly start on the Middle East growth opportunity during the conflict. Do you think the market has responded appropriately or some of the global competitive pressures limited the pricing response in your opinion?

Thanks for the question. I mean the war hasn't really impacted lines outside of those exposed to war. So PV, definitely, there's been a huge reaction. I mentioned on last quarter's call that we're seeing rate increases in some cases in the thousands of percent. I think the market overall has reacted well, but not necessarily that consistently honestly. I think when the ceasefire was announced, I think there were some elements of the market that took a different approach and maybe eased their underwriting requirements.

But I think what's happened since then has hopefully reemphasized to everyone that there is definitely still a large element of uncertainty and volatility that persists in the environment. And the business needs to be underwritten with that in mind. And that's exactly the way we've been doing it. Thankfully, we don't have the exposure to those marine war losses, which based on the most recent articles I've read that estimated between $1.5 billion to $2 billion. I think that's the trickiest part of the book or the war exposed book at the moment.

Up until today, you're hearing of vessels being targeted. So has the reaction been positive? Definitely. Has it been enough? In some cases, yes, in some cases, no. But we will stick to our guns, and we will continue to underwrite the book and manage the exposures in the best way we see fit for us regardless of what the others do. In terms of its impact on other lines of business such as property, construction, it has had absolutely no effect on those other lines whatsoever. People are just focusing on those exposures that the war impacts.

That's great. And then it appears it's been kind of 18 or 19 points of CAT losses a quarter. Have there been any larger losses in the third quarter? Or is it kind of a linear CAT loss expectation as the conflict continues?

Not to our knowledge. I mean, I think ever since, despite there being we call targeted attacks since the ceasefire was announced and the MOU was agreed. There hasn't been that state of losses, definitely not that state of severe losses that you saw in essentially March and April. That's practically where all of our reported losses have emanated from so far this year. It's not to say the situation can't deteriorate to levels we saw in March and April. But it's been fairly quiet on the loss front since then.

And then if I could sneak in just one more. We, I wanted to ask on your approach to capital return here and if at the current valuation, whether you start to shift some of the buybacks towards dividends due to the valuation.

I mean Rowland is something that, I mean, we've got the authorization, the repurchase authorization in place. Obviously, how much we buy, when we buy it at what price all depends on various factors. But the authorization is there, and we will exercise it, whenever we see fit. There will be an element at some point where we're probably not big fans of buying at certain levels. But, and if that's the case, then yes, we will look to distribute similar returns, whether they be in the form of buybacks or dividends. And that's obviously dependent on the level of performance of the business.

[Operator Instructions] And your next question comes from Rowland Mayor from RBC Capital Markets.

I was going to let someone ask a question, but I'm back. Just quickly on the reserving action. Could you help us understand the lines of business impacted and whether there is a change to the current year loss pick associated with it?

Yes. I mean, as I said on the call, Rowland, it was purely down now that the more experience we have and data we have internally on specific lines, especially in the long-tail lines, the more concerted decisions we can make on reserving and the more cautiousness we can apply as well. Again, it's rather insignificant in the large scheme of things, but we felt it was more prudent to just put some reserve back in after looking at the tail.

Now the book overall, as I said on the call, I mean, we've released more than $30 million of prior year reserves so far this year. And for the long-tail segment in and of itself is pretty flat and in line with where we were at the end of last year. So there's nothing specific to it. Just a couple of losses that we felt prudent to take a more cautious approach.

And I'm assuming that's all IBNR at this point?

Pretty much, yes.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks. Please go ahead.

Just a quick thank you for all of you for joining us today, and thanks for your continued support. As always, if you've got any additional questions, you can contact Robin and she'll be happy to assist. And we look forward to speaking to you on next quarter's call. Have a good day, everyone. Thank you.

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.

Good morning, and welcome to the 2026 Annual Journal Meeting of Shareholders of International General Insurance Holdings Limited. Will anything please come to order? I'm Wasef Jabsheh, Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors of International General Insurance Holdings Limited. I will be presiding at this meeting.

Along with my federal directors and executive officers of the company, I would like to thank you for joining us today. We appreciate your attendance your interest and most importantly, your support of International General Insurance Holdings Limited. This Annual General Meeting of Shareholders is held pursuant to the bylaws of the company and written notice to all shareholders. You are participating in the meeting virtually. Our virtual meeting allows us to be more inclusive and reach a greater number of our shareholders. Shareholders may submit questions at any time during this meeting in the space provided on the virtual meeting screen, and we will be -- we will respond after the meeting. After introducing the directors and officers in attendance and dealing with a few procedure matters, we will take up the items to be acted upon.

We would like to introduce the other directors of International General Insurance Holdings Limited who are in attendance today. We welcome our Directors, David King, Wanda Mwaura, Andrew Poole and Thomas Collet. Walid Jabsheh, our Group President and Chief Store Officer as well as our Director nominee, Michael Gray, who are also in attendance. In addition, our Chief Financial Officer, Pervez Rizvi is in attendance.

In accordance with our amended and restated bylaws, I will act as Chairman of the meeting and Shane Gubbins of Conyers Corporate Services Bermuda Limited, will act as secretary of the meeting. In addition, the Board of Directors has appointed a representative from Continental Stock Transfer & Trust Company to serve as the independent inspector of the election for this meeting. Margaret Lloyd from Continental Stock Transfer Trust Company is with us today. I request that she file her oath of office with the secretary of the meeting for inclusion in the minutes of this meeting.

Will the Secretary please report on the proof of notice of meeting?

Thank you, Chairman. I have an affidavit of mailing from Continental Stock Transfer & Trust Company, certifying as to the giving of notice of this Annual General meeting and sending to shareholders of record as of 10th of June 2026 and the notice of Annual General Meeting and online availability of proxy materials, which continental commenced mailing to shareholders on June 25, 2026. A the information circular, the form of proxy card and a copy of the 2025 annual report on Form 20-F were all posted on the meeting host website on June 25, 2026.

The notice of Annual General Meeting and online availability of proxy materials, and affidavit of mailing will be filed with the minutes of this meeting.

The company's financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2025, together with the notice -- with the notes thereto and the and dependent auditor's report thereon are hereby deemed to have been formally presented before the company's shareholders in accordance with the Bermuda law. Copies of the financial statements are included in the 2025 annual report on Form 20-F, which was posted on the meeting host website on June 25, 2026.

Shane, will you please present your report of attendance at this meeting so that we can determine whether a quorum is present?

Mr. Chairman, on June 10, 2026, the record date for this Annual General Meeting that were issued and outstanding and entitled to vote a total of 42,654,198 common shares have been informed by the Inspector of Election that there are 33,604,666 common shares represented by proxy or approximately 78.784% of all of the shares entitled to vote at this Annual General Meeting. The shares so represented exceed 50% of the total shares entitled to vote at this meeting and thus constitute a quorum.

Thank you. On the basis of the report of the Secretary and the Inspector of Election, I find that proper notice has been given and that a quorum is present. Accordingly, this meeting has been properly convened. It is 9:00 -- 7 past 9 a.m on August 4, 2026, and the polls for voting on all matters are open. All International General Insurance Holding Limited shareholders entitled to hold at this meeting have the ability to do so online.

If you are a shareholder entitled to vote and have not yet voted or if you want to change your previously cast vote, please do so via the website used to access this meeting. Please remember that if you have already voted by proxy, it is not necessary to vote again. After watching has been completed on all matters on the agenda, we will close the polls and the inspector of election will provide a preliminary report. We'll move now to a review of the proposals.

The first proposal to come before the meeting is the election of one Class III director to serve until the Annual General Meeting of Shareholders in 2029 or until his successor is duly elected or appointed or his office is otherwise vacated in accordance with the company's amended and restated bylaws. The management of the company we commence the election of the following persons as Class III Director of the company, Michael Gray. As explained in the information circular, Wasef Jabsheh and Wasef Jabsheh have been reappointed as Class III directors pursuant to the applicable appointment rights under the company's amended and restated by laws and are not standing for election by shareholders at this meeting.

Information concerning Mr. Gray's principal occupation, skills and qualifications and other matters, which may be of interest, are contained in the information there. No other nominations were received pursuant to the procedures established in the company's amended and listed bylaws. Therefore, no additional nominations may be made at this meeting, and I declare the nomination to be closed.

The next matter to come before the meeting is the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP. Ernst & Young as the company's independent registered public accounting firm to act as the company's independent auditor for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2026, and the authorization for the Board of Directors acting through the Audit Committee to fix the remuneration of the independent poster for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2026. The Board of Directors recommends the reappointment of Ernst & Young LLP to serve as the company's independent registered public accounting firm and to audit the company's financial statements for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2026. If any shareholder would like to make a comment regarding any of the proposals, please submit your comment through the web portal.

The polls are about to close. So if you've not yet voted, please do so now. Since everyone has had the opportunity to vote, and it is now 9:12 a.m. I hereby declare the polls closed. The Inspector of Election has delivered her preliminary report, and I will now announce the preliminary results.

Based on the inspector of election's preliminary report, Michael Gray, the nominee for election to the Board of Directors has been duly elected by an affirmative vote of the shareholders voting at the meeting. And the reappointment of Ernst & Young as the company's independent registered public accounting firm to act as the company's independent auditor for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2026, and the authorization for the Board of Directors acting through the Audit Committee to fix the remuneration of the independent auditor for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2026, have been approved by an affirmative vote of the shareholders voting at the meeting. We will file the final report of the Inspector of Election with the records of this meeting. We expect to report the results of the voting on an SEC Form 6-K to be filed with the SEC.

That concludes the business for the meeting. The meeting is now adjourned. I thank you for attending today's meeting.

Good day, and welcome to the International General Insurance Holdings Ltd. First Quarter 2026 Financial Results and Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Robin Sidders, Head of Corporate Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, John. And good morning, and welcome to today's conference call. Today, we'll be discussing the financial results for the first quarter 2026, which you will have seen in our press release, which we issued after the market closed yesterday. You can find a copy of the press release in the Investors section of our website at iginsure.com, and we've also posted a supplementary investor presentation, which can be found on our website as well on the Presentations page in the Investors section.

On today's call, our Executive Chairman of IGI, Wasef Jabsheh; President and CEO, Waleed Jabsheh; and Chief Financial Officer, Pervez Rizvi. As always, Wasef will begin the call with some high-level comments before handing over to Waleed to walk through the drivers of the results for the first quarter of 2026 and finish up with our views on market conditions and our outlook for the remainder of the year. Then we'll open the call up for Q&A.

I'll begin with some customary safe harbor language. Our speakers' remarks may contain forward-looking statements. Some of the forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words. 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.

These forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. While actual events or results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, including the risk factors set forth in the company's annual report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2025.

The company's reports on Form 6-K and other filings with the SEC as well as our results press release issued yesterday evening. And we take no -- we undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they are made.

During this call, we'll use certain non-GAAP financial measures. For a reconciliation of these measures to the nearest GAAP measure, please see our earnings release, which has been filed with the SEC and is available on our website. With that, I'll turn the call over to our Executive Chairman, Wasef Jabsheh.

Thank you, Robin, and good day, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's call. As you saw from our first quarter financial results that we issued last night, we are off to a strong start in 2026. On their own, these results are excellent, but viewed in the context of our long-term performance, they underscore the value of consistency and discipline in executing our strategy.

Long-term success in our business depends heavily on consistency and discipline. No matter what is going on in the world around us -- this is particularly true for IGI given the scope of our portfolio, the high severity lines of business we are writing and our global footprint.

Our value proposition and promise is to provide peace of mind in times of uncertainty to maximize shareholders' returns over time while being a stable, reliable and fair partner to our customers. The first quarter of 2026 has certainly seen its fair share of uncertainty with the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, socially, politically and economically. It is not just impacting the region, but is having global ramifications as well. Already, we are hearing insured market loss estimate upwards of the EUR 3 billion mark. When we established IGI in Amman, Jordan, almost 25 years ago, our initial focus was almost exclusively on the Middle East region.

It's a region we know and understand well and where our relationships are some of the longest in our history. I'll leave it to Waleed to talk more about our Middle East exposures and the dynamics of what is happening in the region. But before I do, I want to reiterate our -- how pleased I am with our performance in the first quarter, notwithstanding the tragic consequences of the war.

As we look ahead to our 25 anniversary year in 2027, I'm immensely proud of all that we have accomplished at IGI. We are a relatively small player in the global insurance landscape, yet we are definitely punching well above our weight in terms of expertise and execution.

This is clearly demonstrated in our financial performance and the significant value that we generate for our shareholders consistently year after year. I will now hand over to Waleed to discuss the numbers in more detail and talk about market conditions and our outlook. And I'll remain on the call for any questions at the end. Waleed?

Good morning. Thank you, Wasef, and thank you all for joining us today. As Wasef or like Wasef, I'm very pleased with our performance in the first quarter. In the face of increasing competitive pressures and heightened global uncertainty, our results are a clear demonstration of our resilience and also stability. Our diversified platform and strong and consistent execution provide us with a lot of optionality, as we've said in the past, and I truly commend all of our people for their focus and skill in capitalizing on the opportunities that are coming out for this uncertainty.

Just turning specifically to the results for the first quarter. I'm going to focus on the key points, the drivers behind the numbers, and then we'll open it up for any questions you may have at the end. And I'll start with some key highlights for the first quarter. We recorded gross written premiums of $197.2 million. That's a 4.5% decline from Q1 '25 and reflects our cycle management actions in the face of increasingly tough market conditions.

We recorded new business across our portfolio, but this was offset somewhat by the nonrenewal of two reinsurance programs. One non-renewed, which was our decision and the other one where the cedent decided to retain and not buy the reinsurance anymore. Underwriting income came in at $37.7 million. That's an increase of 35.1% over the first quarter of 2025, and that resulted in a combined ratio of 89.1% for the quarter. That's 5.3 points better than Q1 of last year and in line with our long-term averages. Combined ratio for Q1 includes about $15 million of net losses related to the Middle East conflict, and I'll talk about that more in a moment. Return on average equity was 12.7%, and the core ROE was 14.3%, both also in line with our long-term averages.

Book value per share was $15.60. That's a slight decline from year-end 2025, but that includes total capital return to shareholders of almost $65 million. That's made up of $51.5 million in dividends, that includes the special dividend of $1.15 that we paid out in April. And then further share repurchases amounted to just over $13.1 million.

Net premiums earned were $111.2 million, relatively flat with the same period of last year. Combined ratio of 89.1% for the first quarter, that includes 19.2 points of cat losses, primarily related to the Middle East war losses and 29 points of favorable prior year reserve development. That compares to Q1 of last year, where the combined ratio was 94.4%, which included 25 points of accident year cat losses and just under 23 points of favorable reserve development.

One thing to point out is that this -- during the first quarter of this year, currency revaluation movements were much less of a feature than some prior quarters and especially compared to the first quarter of last year. All in, we delivered core operating income of $24.4 million or $0.56 per share for the first -- for Q1 of this year versus $19.5 million or $0.42 per share for the first quarter of last year. Specifically on our segment results, we'll start off with the short-tail segment, where conditions continue to be quite mixed. And that's evident in our results for the first quarter.

Rates are still adequate overall, but there's a lot of variation in the level of adequacy from one line to another. And I'll expand on this in a few minutes. Top line was down just by 4%. Underwriting income was down considerably year-over-year, but still in very positive territory at $9.5 million. This is in spite of the level of losses related to the war, again, amounting to about $15 million, mainly recorded in the political violence line, as well as an energy loss in the Persian Gulf.

This ultimately really speaks to how we manage risk and the resilience we've built in our portfolio. In the reinsurance segment, where conditions are becoming more competitive in the business we write, underwriting income was up just under 6% for the first quarter. That's on a lower level of gross written premium and net earned premiums. As I said, there were two programs we non-renewed. But on the flip side, we're starting to see some decent opportunities in the specialty treaty lines. I'll also talk about that in a moment. The long-tail segment was a bright spot in our segment results. We posted 22% increase in top line, driven by new business in most lines, but most notably within the professional indemnity and marine liability lines. You'll recall that this has been the more challenging area of our portfolio for the past 2, 3 years and where we took the decision to nonrenew business with the expectation that in doing so, the overall profitability profile of the segment would improve. Ultimately, underwriting income was up significantly by about $25 million, and that's on a slightly higher net earned premiums due to a higher volume of premiums written. Just quickly to the balance sheet. Total assets were $2.1 billion. Total investments in cash, $1.3 billion. Allocation to fixed income securities generated just over $14 million investment income in the first quarter, and that's a yield of 4.3%. And the average duration came down very slightly to 3.5 years.

During Q1, we repurchased a little over 545,000 common shares. Average price per share was $24.11. At the end of the quarter, we had about 4.1 million shares still outstanding under our existing 5 million common share repurchase authorization. Total equity was $653.6 million at the end of the quarter, and that includes the almost 65 million share repurchases, the common share dividend mentioned earlier, including the special that was paid in April. Now that compares to total equity of just over $710 million at the end of 2025.

Ultimately, we recorded a return on average equity of 12.7% and a core operating ROE of 14.3%. So very strong results, especially considering the overall market softening and the heightened level of uncertainty around the globe. Now before I turn to our market outlook, I'd just like to expand on some of Wasef's comments about the Middle East as it continues to be an important region for us. And I think that in some pockets, there's still a bit of a perception that IGI is predominantly a Middle Eastern company. Now in reality, we're a truly global company with a strong presence and understanding of all our markets. Now that's particularly true in the Middle East through the -- through our offices in Amman and Dubai, where we've been serving clients for decades now.

Specific losses incurred in the first quarter of the year were primarily in the political violence book and predominantly in the UAE and Bahrain relating to physical damage as well as the energy loss I mentioned earlier on the upstream side relating to damage to an oil facility in the Persian Gulf. Now this provides a good pivot for me to turn to our view of the market. The world is clearly a lot more uncertain today than even a year ago. I mean we're seeing instability in many regions around the world, and this is leading to an interesting dynamic in that we're seeing some decent opportunities come out of this uncertainty and dislocation.

Now it's an unfortunate fact, but a reality or the reality of our business that market corrections and improving conditions only happen after significant loss and tragedy. So what this represents really is a little short-term pain for a longer-term gain. The elevated level of competitive pressure across the market that we talked about on the last quarter's call is still very much prevalent, but our vast diversification, broad product offering, global footprint and the local knowledge that we have provides us with a level of resilience and, as we always say, optionality. Turning a bit to our geographic markets and the opportunities we're seeing. I'll start with the Middle East. As I mentioned earlier, we've got teams in Amman and Dubai.

They work closely with our London teams to capitalize on the opportunities arising from the current dynamic. Where we're seeing the most opportunity here is obviously in the PV line, as that is where the bulk of the losses are. And that's in a market, also, which is long overdue for a risk-adjusted pricing correction. Pricing is now many, many multiples of where it was before the war. And when I say that, I mean in some cases, the rate increases we're achieving are amounting to -- in the thousands of percentage point increases. Policy structures are improving. Limits are shrinking significantly.

And where there's historically been an overabundance of Middle East PV capacity, it's now much, much less ample. There's very clearly a changing perception of war risk in the region. And we can capitalize on that effectively and efficiently because we've already -- we already have the experience, significant experience. We already have the relationships, and we have the presence in the region. Now in other -- in other geographic regions like the U.S., Europe, Asia-Pac, the story is fairly similar to what we've said on prior calls.

I'm not going to spend too much time on this, but we're continuing as always to look at these markets in a bigger way and look at new markets at the same time. Now turning to specific lines of business. I'll start with our reinsurance segment, our treaty portfolio. Margins here are still healthy, but competitive pressures are becoming increasingly prevalent as we've been hearing from everybody else. The opportunities here are more concentrated in specialty treaty lines. And that's where there have been significant losses. So, basically, marine, energy and terror and political violence. You'll recall that we added a new senior specialty treaty reinsurance underwriter last October. So we're well positioned at the right time to develop and diversify this part of the portfolio.

In our long-tail segment, we continue to be cautiously optimistic as we've been saying for the last couple of quarters. We're seeing some new opportunities and good deal flow, and you saw that in our first quarter results, especially in the more niche segments like marine liability. Specifically relating to the Baltimore bridge collapse, back in 2024, we've all seen in the news reports that losses are now estimated to be as high, if not in excess, $2.8 billion. And that makes it the single largest loss in the history of the marine market.

This is affecting marine markets globally, particularly the liability side. I want to be clear that IGI doesn't expect any material change in our loss estimates related to this event that we recorded 2 years ago. Instead, I think this is very clearly an opportunity for us to capitalize on improved pricing and demand for capital to grow and expand our direct liability book. We've already seen some of that in 2026, and it's widely expected that renewal rates for the remainder of this year and into 2027 will continue to improve.

Now turning to our short-tail portfolio. I've already spoken about PV. Short-tail marine lines like cargo and specifically cargo war and war on land. We're seeing some positive traction coming out of the war in the Middle East in these areas. Our energy book and certain areas of our property book, 2 of our largest lines are clearly tougher than a year ago.

And even since the beginning of this year, we've seen those competitive pressures further increase to the point of honestly being quite irrational in some cases. Having said that, we continue to see relatively healthy conditions in the more specialist lines like construction and engineering, a continued excellent deal flow and contingency also continues to be a bright spot, and that's a book that continues to grow for us.

So definitely some very good opportunities in the pipeline for us. And this is in spite of the competitive pressures in some of the pockets we spoke about. I mean -- but that, of course, is the nature of our business. In the context of our size, breadth of offering, global footprint, financial strength and ultimately, the expertise of our people, it is a little easier for us to move the dial and write new healthy margin business. We've got a lot of levers to work with, and we're in the position we need to be in right now to take advantage of the opportunities in front of us. Now the underpinning of our strategy and what our track record is built upon, as we've always said, is our disciplined execution. This is embedded in our DNA. We are a resilient company with an almost quarter of a decade history -- a quarter of a century history, excuse me, of consistency and stability.

Our position in the market is much stronger today, and we've shown that we won't compromise on our principles or values under pressure. We've demonstrated clearly that we're not afraid to say no when business doesn't meet our terms or profitability thresholds. And we won't, under any circumstances, sacrifice the bottom line to benefit the top line. Our focus is on intelligence risk selection, paying attention to the small print and being aware of what's going on around us. It's embedded in our corporate culture.

So we will continue to do what we do best. that is to deliver on our promise of being a fair partner to all our stakeholders while generating superior value for our shareholders. So I'm going to pause here, and we will turn it over for questions.

Operator, we're ready to take the first question, please.

[Operator Instructions]

Our first question comes from the line of Rowland Mayor with RBC Capital Markets.

I wanted to quickly say that given all that's going on in the Middle East, I hope everyone at IGIC's family is safe and then congrats on a strong year given all the moving pieces.

Thank you, Rowland. No, I'm glad to say that everybody is in good shape and spirits.

Could you help me with this large non-cat energy loss? And what was the size of it and what happened there?

Yes. Basically, I mean, this is an event that actually was a direct -- indirect consequence of the war where a large support vessel in the energy industry collided into an offshore oil platform. The circumstances around it are not the precautions, but I believe the unfortunate actions that were taken to -- because of the war and the circumstances around the fighting, where, not enough safety measures were taken, and GPS was turned off, lights were turned off and they decided to make a run for it and ended up colliding with an offshore platform.

So it was an unfortunate incident, but that's what we're here for. In terms of the amount for us, that loss amounted to about $10.5 million net to us in the quarter. So those were the circumstances of the loss.

Okay. That's very helpful. And then I wanted to ask on the durability of the opportunity in the political violence and war market. With all the excess capital in the industry today, would you expect that to be durable? Or do you think people will start to rush in once there's some signs of stability in the region?

I mean it depends on your perception of the region. I mean if you're asking me, I can't control what the rest of the market does. I don't think if a political agreement is -- comes to fruition, I don't think that necessarily should or would result in the market piling back in and ignoring what's happened over the last couple of months. I think there's a lot of pain. I mentioned or -- Wasef mentioned the estimated market losses are upwards of EUR 3 billion, and some are talking close to EUR 4 billion. You take that into -- put that into context, the global political violence market premium is estimated to be around $1.5 billion.

So it's been -- this event on its own in one of the smallest PV markets actually in the world, has created so much pain and agony for those involved. So I think regardless of what happens politically, the uncertainty will continue to be there. And I think this -- I'm hoping is a long-term opportunity where, we could quickly make back a lot of the losses that we've incurred and the market can as a whole.

As I mentioned earlier, I mean, we're seeing huge, huge multiples in rate increases. And like I said, in some cases, over in the thousands of percent. And so as I mentioned as well, short-term pain for longer term gain, and I truly believe that is the case on this occasion.

And then if I could squeeze in one more. It looks like the first quarter had bigger reserve releases than other quarters. Can you maybe just walk through what drove the development this quarter?

Yes. I mean I think that's just reinforces what we've always said on of how we approach the reserving side. I mean, if -- putting aside the events of the quarter, I mean, it was an unbelievable quarter for us and prior years continue to perform ahead of expectation. Now the releases weren't concentrated in any specific segment. It was pretty much across the board. But I think it's just a testament to the cautious approach that we always said we take to reserve releases. And we expect that pattern to continue in the coming quarters and years.

As the market deteriorates, I mean, just to give you an idea, as the market -- as we plan, as we update our plans every 6 to 12 months, we update our plan loss ratios, based on our expectation and based on the changing market conditions. And so with the competitive pressures that we've been seeing recently, obviously, our approach will become more cautious. And in the initial 12 months of any accident here, we're pretty much reserving to plan. And following that, we start to take a hard look at actual true incurred performance. And on that basis, that dictates the -- what you call it, the amount or level of reserve development that occurs.

Our next question comes from the line of Michael Phillips with Oppenheimer.

I guess first quick numbers question. Can you give a dollar impact of the two reinsurance contracts that roll off in the quarter?

From from -- I mean, these are portfolios of business that we reinsure. Now one of them -- I mean, it combined, it's probably in the mid to high single-digit millions of dollars in terms of GWP. Now one of them, just to give you some clarity around that, Mike, is that the one we chose to walk away from was because obviously, as we mentioned, we had -- we brought in a specialty treaty underwriter tail end of last year. And that is the book that he would write is something similar to -- what you call it, is similar to what the book that we walked away from.

So it's basically bringing that in-house capability in-house rather than relying on -- or piggybacking on somebody else's portfolio. And then the second one, as I said, the cedent would you call it, decided they wanted to retain the portfolio rather than reinsure part of it out, plain and simple.

Okay. And I just kind of want to circle over on the Middle East stuff. Opportunity is obviously going to come from this. Waleed, when you talk about multiples of rate increases that are in the thousands. I guess I'm trying to get a sense of -- I think political violence for you is in terms of premium is, low single-digit, but other lines that could be affected to create opportunity. Is there a way you can help us think about what's your mix of overall premium that could be affected by this in terms of these opportunities?

Political violence, again, is a big loss line, but I think, again, it's only, what, 2% or 3% of your premium. So what other lines when you talk about these rate increases that are so strong because of what's happened in the Middle East could be affected by your book?

In terms of giving an idea on premium, I think it's very difficult and very early to be able to give any sort of ideas. But I mean, by far, the most -- what do you call it, the line that will have -- will be impacted in the conditions -- terms and conditions will be impacted the most and 100% based on what we've seen and experienced so far is on the political violence side. Not only are the rates multiplying by 10, 15, 20x, but the limits are shrinking, capacity is dwindling. Line sizes are being adjusted by all the players.

Now where I think there's definitely opportunity is again on the marine side, especially on marine -- anything to do related with war, hull war, cargo war, war on land. But we haven't seen the activity in those areas come to fruition in the same -- to the same level that we see in the political violence side. I think it will come. Ultimately, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively still shut with a limited number of ships going in and out. And until those ships are able to now to sail freely, you're not going to see the abundance of that business. So when that happens, I think that you're going to be seeing plenty of opportunity in those lines of business.

But our big focus right now is on the political violence side. And I think that's the -- what you call it, the hanging fruit, if you want to call it that. And I think that will continue. And as I reiterate in my response to Roland's question, I think this is going to be a prolonged opportunity. Where markets will be making their money back, I believe, in quite a short period of time because the conditions regardless of what political agreements or resolutions, I think there were always following these last couple of months, there always the heightened level of uncertainty and cautiousness by the market will stick around for quite a bit, and it should.

The type -- I guess next question is a little weird, but the type of losses that you experienced from these events in the Middle East, do they offer -- they are different kind of losses that we're sort of used to given the infrequent nature of these kind of things. But do these offer any different opportunity for you to have recoverables later? The example you gave of the non-cat loss and the oil rig, made me think of this. But are there different types of opportunities for recoverables from war events down the road?

Nothing outside of the ordinary. I mean, war is war, nobody -- there's no sort of recovery in terms of subrogation or anything like that, that you can think I don't see that happening. Now in terms of the energy loss itself, obviously, the owners of the platform can recover or so look to recover from the owners of the vessel. Now we ensure the platform. We don't -- we have nothing to do with the vessel itself. So over time, we may be able to recover from the owners of the vessel. And it's pretty clear what happened.

The issue you have here is there are statute limitations based on maritime law that limit how much you can recover regardless of the extent of the damage. And that depends on the vessel and its size and its various characteristics of the vessel. We're not 100% certain what those limitations are in this case. But my suspicion is that there will be an element of recovery. I'm not confident that it will be a significant element relative to the size of the actual loss in 100% terms.

Okay. And then maybe just last one, kind of on the same topic. 1Q, we had March. Is there -- is it fair for us to maybe just extrapolate? -- I guess the question is really, what since 1Q look like for those type of losses since the end of the quarter?

Sorry, I didn't get that, Mike.

Yes. Just as we think about 2Q and cat losses for you guys, given the exposure in the Middle East, is it fair for us to kind of think about you had 1 month of losses in March and maybe just extrapolate from there what the second quarter might look like once we see that?

I mean, March was definitely the busiest month. And will there be a continued development of these losses in Q2? Undoubtedly, of course. I mean, any losses that happen will continue to develop. And the -- there was further activity in April. Now most of April was fairly quiet, except for the first week, 10 days. So the event is not necessarily over. And obviously, if there is no political solution to all of this, I'm hoping there is, but if there isn't, then the situation will continue to evolve and develop.

I think the positive thing about political violence business is that the coverages are all provided on an aggregate basis. So once you -- once -- if you get -- as a loss impacts a specific policy that erodes all the limit purchased, there is no second or third event that can happen. It's an aggregate policy and that coverage is exhausted and you're not exposed to it anymore. So that's the positive aspect. So in answer to your question, will there be continued development? Yes. I would expect that development to be more limited than it was in Q1.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to the management for closing remarks.

Well, thank you all for joining us today, as always, and thanks for your continued support for IGI. If anybody has any additional questions, please contact Robin and she'll be happy to assist. And we look forward to speaking to you all on the Q2 call. Have a good day, everyone. Thank you.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

Good day, and welcome to the International General Insurance Holdings Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025 Financial Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note, this event is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference over to Robin Sidders, Head of Corporate Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Danielle, and good morning. Welcome to today's conference call. Today, we'll be discussing the financial results for the fourth quarter and full year 2025. We issued a press release after the close yesterday, and you can find that on our website in the Investor Relations section at iginsure.com.

We've also posted a supplementary investor presentation, which can be found on our website as well on the Presentations page in the Investors section.

On today's call are Executive Chairman of IGI, Wasef Jabsheh; President and CEO, Waleed Jabsheh; and Chief Financial Officer, Pervez Rizvi. As always, Wasef will begin the call with some high-level comments before handing over to Waleed to talk through the key drivers of our results for the fourth quarter and full year 2025 and finish up with our views on market conditions and our outlook for the remainder of 2026, and then we'll open the call up for Q&A.

I'll begin with the customary safe harbor language. Our speakers' remarks may contain forward-looking statements. Some of the forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words. 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.

Forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Actual events or results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, including the risk factors set forth in the company's annual report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2024, the company's reports on Form 6-K and other filings with the SEC as well as our press release issued last evening.

We undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements which speak only as of the date they are made.

During this call, we will use certain non-GAAP financial measures. For a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures to the nearest GAAP measure, please see our earnings release, which has been filed with the SEC and is available on our website, as I said.

With that, I'll turn the call over to Executive Chairman, Wasef Jabsheh.

Thank you, Robin, and good day, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's call. I'm very pleased with the outstanding results we achieved in 2025. Next year will be IGI's 25th anniversary year, which is quite a milestone for us. We have built a successful track record of consistently strong performance, generating significant value for our shareholders over this time.

I'm delighted that in addition to our solid financial results, highlighted by roughly 14% growth in book value, plus the return of more than $108 million to shareholders through our capital management actions that we announced a special dividend of $1.15 per share this morning. This is the third consecutive year that we have taken decision to pay a special dividend in addition to our regular quarterly dividend.

Our ability to do this really shows how our confidence in the strength of our balance sheet and our capital position is. And it rewards our shareholders for their trust and support of IGI over the years. I want to congratulate all of our people whose focus, dedication and loyalty not only produced these results, but who have helped to build our track record for over more than 2 decades. I'm very proud of the people we have at IGI. It is their passion for our business and their belief in what we have built and continue to build at IGI that continues to drive our success.

With this excellent foundation, I'm confident that we will continue to serve as a stable market for our customers and generate strong value for our shareholders in '26 and beyond.

I will now hand over to Waleed to discuss the numbers in more detail and talk about market conditions and our outlook, and I'll remain on the call for any questions at the end. Go ahead, Waleed.

Thank you, Wasef. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us on the call today. As Wasef said, we had an excellent fourth quarter, capping off what was another exceptional year for IGI. Strong underwriting execution, strong investment performance, all of which leading to a very solid bottom line result. This adds a further set of data points to what is a very strong and consistent track record that we've built now over the past 24 years.

To begin with, I'm just going to run through the key highlights of our performance for 2025 before delving into detail into the results. In the last 12 months, we delivered more than $161 million in underwriting income, leading to a combined ratio of just under 86% for the year. That's well below our 10-year average. Delivered a return on average equity of 18.6%, also well below our -- well above our 10-year average. Book value per share growth of almost 14% to $16.91. And finally, capital return to shareholders of more than $108 million in dividends and share repurchases.

And as Wasef mentioned, we announced our ordinary common share dividend in our press release last night and declared another extraordinary special cash dividend this morning, this time, $1.15 per common share, marking the third consecutive year now that we've paid a special cash dividend.

This level of performance is the result of a very well laid out, well-understood strategy that's executed at a very high level consistently year after year. And our history has shown that this strategy is what works for us and drives sustainable value to our business partners, shareholders and our employees. We have what we believe are strategic advantages and attributes that are unique to IGI and that underpin the results we are able to achieve. One, we have a high-performance profitability-driven culture underpinned by strict discipline in underwriting. Two, we've got deep specialist and technical expertise driven by years of experience and an on-the-ground presence in our core regions, allowing us to do business in a manner that is culturally compatible with our markets. Three, we're value-driven, we're long-term focused. And finally, four, our significant insider ownership and founder manager mindset aligns directly with shareholder interest.

Our view of success, as we've said time and time again is not over a 1- or 2-year period, but a much longer-term period encompassing ever-changing conditions, dynamics in our market and more broadly, global social and economic environments that are constantly shifting.

Now I'll move on to the results for the fourth quarter and full year of 2025. I'm going to do this just a little bit differently and really focus on the key points for the quarter and the year and what the drivers are behind the numbers. And then I'm happy to answer any questions any of you may have at the end. Starting with the top line, and as we said would be the case on prior calls, gross premiums written in the fourth quarter were down $33.4 million or just over 19%. Similarly, gross premiums for the full year were down by the same dollar amount, $33.4 million, and that's equivalent to about 4.8 percentage points. This predominantly relates to the nonrenewal of a large professional indemnity binder in our long-tail portfolio that we disclosed to you on our Q2 call last year.

At that time, we said the impact would flow through 4 consecutive quarters starting with Q3 and that the largest portion, which is about half of the total, would be reflected in Q4. So that's what you're predominantly seeing in the top line movements for the quarter.

Net premiums earned were $111.4 million for Q4 '25 versus $120.6 million for the same period in the year before. For the full year, net premiums earned were $453.8 million versus $483.1 million. For the full year, also net premiums earned included the impact of reinstatement premiums on loss-affected business amounting to $10.2 million. We've mentioned this on previous calls. And as I've said before, our reinsurance buying approach is very strategic, aiming really to help mitigate volatility in the high severity lines of business that we write.

It's important to note that our reinsurance purchasing patterns vary depending on where we are in the market cycle. For example, we tend to buy more facultative coverage during periods of softer market conditions, and we retain more risk in harder market conditions. Now this is all part of our cycle management strategy, but it can definitely sometimes result in some distortion in the component parts of our combined ratio, and I'll talk more about that in a moment.

Now the combined ratio for Q4 of '25 was 82%, and that included 18.1 points of accident year cat losses and 5.2 points of favorable reserve development. This compares to 77.8% for Q4 of '24, which included 6 points of accident year cat losses and 2.3 points of favorable reserve development. The Q4 2024 combined ratio also benefited from the impact of about 18.3 points of foreign currency revaluation.

The full year ' 25 combined ratio was just under 86% and included 14.5 points of accident year cat losses and just under 8 points of favorable reserve development. The full year combined ratio was also negatively impacted by about 6 points of negative currency revaluation movement.

Now this compares to a full year 2024 combined ratio of 79.9%, which included 9 points of accident year cat losses, 7.7 points of favorable reserve development and just under 2 points of positive currency revaluation. So if you're looking at it on an FX-neutral basis, we're comparing 79.9% combined ratio for the full year 2025 to 81.8% for 2024.

Now during the fourth quarter of 2025, currency revaluation movements played very tiny miniscule part on our results. But for the full year, in line with the first 3 quarters' results and the commentary there, the volatility of the U.S. dollar during that -- those 3 quarters against our major transactional currencies impacted a number of line items in the results.

Now just a few comments on the G&A expense ratio. For the fourth quarter and full year of '25 versus the same period in '24, we saw increases of 5.9 points or $4.8 million and 2.7 points or $6.6 billion, respectively. Now this is largely the result of new hires, systems costs and a number of other items, which are all part of the investments we've made in the build-out of our business and in our visibility in the market. So you're seeing a higher dollar expense load in the fourth quarter versus Q4 in 2024. The higher fourth quarter '25 expense ratio is then compounded by the lower level of period-over-period net premiums earned.

I would also say that the fourth quarter 2024 G&A ratio -- expense ratio benefited from a reclassification of expenses from the G&A line to the acquisition cost line. So the Q4 year-over-year comparison isn't really on an apples-to-apples basis.

For the full year, you're also seeing the effect of the strengthening of the pound versus our dollar reporting currency during '25. And this directly reflects and impacts the level of G&A expenses that are transacted in pounds, which for our business is fairly chunky. Generally speaking, the total expense ratio provides a true reflection of overall expenses as a component part. And I'm talking here about G&A combined with acquisition costs. And that would -- but that will move around a bit at this stage of the cycle depending upon the cycle management actions that we take.

All in, we delivered net income of $32.3 million or $0.76 per share for Q4 of '25 versus $30 million or $0.65 per share for the same quarter in 2024. For the full year, in 2025, we generated net income of $127.2 million or $2.89 per share versus $135 million or $2.98 per share in 2024.

Moving on to our segment results. In the Short-tail segment, conditions are somewhat mixed, but rates remain broadly adequate. Underwriting income in this segment improved by over 14% for the fourth quarter and declined a little over 7% for the full year, and that's largely due to a lower level of net premiums earned as well as a higher level of ceded premiums.

As I mentioned a moment ago, part and parcel of our cycle management is taking advantage of reduced reinsurance pricing with the aim always to protect and mitigate the volatility in our portfolio. And this definitely becomes more pronounced as the cycle softens.

In the Reinsurance segment, conditions generally remain strong and pricing more than adequate in the business that we write. Underwriting income was down about 4.5% in Q4, predominantly due to a lower level of net earned premiums. But for the full year, underwriting was up almost 30%, and this is a better measure of the true performance of this segment in 2025 and also reflects a shift in focus we made in late 2022 to the higher-margin reinsurance business as part of our cycle management actions, which we've spoken about previously.

Now the Long-tail segment continued -- well, Long-tail segment has continued to be the area of our portfolio that has definitely been the most challenging for several years now. But it's also where we're hopeful for some improvement in 2026 or at least a bottoming out in pricing and conditions. This is the area where we also took action in the second quarter of the year when we've nonrenewed the large account, the PI binder that I mentioned -- we mentioned before, and that's what impacted the top line, both in Q4 and full year for this segment.

Underwriting income for both the fourth quarter and full year of '25 was impacted by lower net earned premiums and more pronounced here is also by the currency valuation movements since this portfolio is primarily transacted in British pounds. Underwriting income of $10 million for Q4 '25. That compares to $14.3 million in Q4 '24. For the full year, we recorded underwriting income of $10.9 million versus $39.5 million for the full year in 2024. Now again, going back to the foreign exchange on an FX-neutral basis, that would have been $29.2 million for '25 versus $34.3 million for '24.

If we turn to the balance sheet, total assets were $2.1 billion. Total investments, cash were $1.32 billion. The allocation to fixed income securities makes up a little over 80% of our investments and cash portfolio. That generated $14.2 million in investment income in Q4 and just under $55 million for the full year. That's a yield of about 4.2%. And we held the duration fairly steady at about 3.6 years.

During the fourth quarter, we repurchased just under 344,000 common shares, average price per share $23.51. At the end of the year, we had about 4.65 million common shares remaining under the new $5 million common share repurchase authorization that we announced before last quarter's call. For us, share repurchases are a strong value generation lever for us, and we view them as highly accretive and excellent value for our shareholders.

At the end of the year, total equity was $710 million, and that includes the share repurchases and common share dividends, including the special dividend of $0.85 that we distributed back in April. This compares to total equity of about $655 million at the end of 2024. Ultimately, we recorded a return on average shareholders' equity of 18.5% for Q4 and 18.6% for the full year. From a total return perspective, we grew book value per share by almost 14% in 2025, and we returned a total of about $62 million to shareholders in share repurchases and just over $46 million in common share dividends.

So all in, an excellent quarter and full year for IGI. Now if I turn to our view on the market briefly, I mean, there isn't a whole lot more that is new or groundbreaking that you haven't really heard -- already heard from others. We've heard various iterations from across the market that things are getting more competitive, and that's entirely accurate. There's very clearly an elevated level of competitive pressure across much of the market, but it continues to be fairly disciplined, but I'll admit, a little less disciplined than anticipated at 1/1. Most important right now is context and the reality is that while rates are under pressure, they do remain adequate in many of the lines of business that we write. And just as an indication, we saw declines averaging around 10% at 1/1.

Looking at specific segments of our portfolio, I'll start with the Reinsurance lines and segments. I mean, margins here are still very healthy. And because of this, this is also the area where we're seeing the greatest push for market share, particularly from the larger carriers. And -- but for us, this is where our S&P upgrade has definitely helped us raise our profile. And as a result, we're seeing more business that we may not have seen otherwise.

Short-tail portfolio remains mixed. Our energy book and certain areas of our property book, which, as you're aware, are 2 of our largest lines, those continue to be tougher than a year ago, and I would say is the areas where we're seeing the most significant pressure.

Having said that, I mean, we're continuing to see relatively healthy conditions in the more specialist lines such as construction and engineering. I mean, in that line, there's a strong pipeline of opportunities out there, particularly with the increase in infrastructure projects and also the number of data centers being built in various geographies around the world.

Similarly, in the marine lines that we write, such as cargo and liability, in these areas, terms and conditions are still holding up reasonably well, and they continue to present new opportunities for us. As I've mentioned before as well, contingency is also still very much a bright spot for us.

In our Long-tail segment, we're cautiously optimistic in our outlook as we're seeing some leveling off in the professional financial lines after several sequential quarters of pricing deterioration. Obviously, this is a little different to what you may be hearing from some U.S. carriers. But remember, we don't write any long-tail U.S. business.

Now in our PI, Professional Indemnity portfolio, which is predominantly U.K.-based, the pace of decline appears to be leveling off. Our relationships across this business are providing us with some new opportunities and a good and healthy deal flow, especially in the more niche segments of the [ market ].

Similarly, in both FI, Financial Institutions, and D&O, we're still seeing some reductions, but the magnitude of decline is definitely narrowing and the pace is slowing. In our geographic markets, similar -- very similar commentary to what we said before, continued focus on the U.S. and specialty treaty and short-tail portfolios, and we're continuing to build up our profile and presence across various geographies, including Europe, MENA region and Asia-Pac.

Now for IGI specifically, context is really critical here. Now for a company of our size, our global strategy and footprint are quite unique. Over the past several years, as is natural to do when market conditions are in your favor and conducive, we've invested heavily in growing our top line, and we've taken actions to strengthen and fortify our business in preparation for when conditions change and become less favorable.

One of our most important achievements coming out of this has been our recent financial strength rating upgrade by S&P, which not only underscores the quality of our results and the strength of our balance sheet, but the confidence that S&P have in our ability to continue doing this consistently into the future. Our level of diversification and our strategy of having local talent with high levels of local knowledge positioned in our core regions means we've got much better chance of success in competing for business that isn't necessarily coming to London.

I said on prior calls that domestic markets across the globe are becoming stronger, making our local operations even more important. Our people on the ground in these markets have specialist technical and marketing expertise. They've got strong network of relationships. And they've got the ability to interact face-to-face and understand the dynamics of how business is transacted in these local markets. For us, that is a clear benefit that provides a lot of leverage.

In the context of our size, footprint and our financial strength, it's a little easier for us relative to our larger competitors to move the dial. That means -- what I mean by that is that we can still find profitable opportunities to write new business across many lines and many geographies within our portfolio whilst maintaining healthy margins. Now while it's perhaps a little harder in today's environment, we have given ourselves a lot more levers to work with in mitigating and managing these conditions better than even 18 months ago.

Especially important is that all of our actions are aimed at protecting the book we've built while continuing to generate healthy margins and add to our value proposition. And that is, in essence, all part of the dynamic cycle management which we're constantly banging the drums of and is the nature of our business and something we have successfully navigated numerous times in our almost now 25-year history.

Having said all that and given where we are in the cycle, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that we're likely to see some contraction in top line in certain areas of the portfolio where we decide to walk away from business that, as we've said before, simply doesn't meet our embedded profitability or coverage targets. We've seen this in our general aviation book, which over the last couple of years, we've virtually halved in size due to the tough market conditions. And we're seeing it today in some other lines. But it's this strict discipline that we always talk about that drives us to take these sorts of actions and puts us in a position of optimal strength to make the most of opportunities when they come without being encumbered by short-term thinking decisions of the past.

Looking at 2026, the key focus remains the same: focus, consistency, discipline. This is exactly what underpins successful cycle management and leads to consistent high-quality results and value creation that is sustainable through all stages of the cycle.

Just in closing, I mean, we have outstanding teams at IGI and our track record over almost now 25 years clearly demonstrates not only that we're not just a fair-weather company, but that we won't compromise our principles or values under pressure. We have the experience and we've built a level of resilience in IGI that has put us in a much stronger position than we were going into the last soft cycle, and that is what will continue to drive our success forward for the benefit of all stakeholders.

So I'm going to pause there, and we'll turn it over for questions. Operator, we're ready to take the first question, please.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Michael Phillips from Oppenheimer.

The next question comes from Rowland Mayor from RBC Capital Markets.

Could you maybe walk through the state of competition? And I heard all your comments on it, but I just wanted to understand, do you think the durability of maybe the pricing competition, particularly in property, are we reaching a sort of bottom here? Or do you expect to continue throughout 2026?

Rowland, thanks for the question. I mean, the competition is in line with what we've been really seeing now for many -- quite a few quarters. I mentioned earlier that energy and property lines seem to be the most pressured. I guess, at some point, I don't anticipate that pressure easing off, although there has been talk in the market about the refining aspect of the downstream book and how poorly the results were in 2025 in that area. The hunger seems to still be out there.

That being said, I think there's a lot of hunger on the reinsurance side. And in part of the cycle management, it's not just a discipline on the inwards business, but trading in this environment and taking advantage of the opportunities that a soft market provides and leveraging those opportunities against that inwards business, making it attractive and adequate to get involved with.

So do I see any sort of short-term let down in the competition? In all honesty, I don't. But we can deal with that. We can manage it. We've managed it on the long-tail lines now for quite a few years. And as I mentioned, on the aviation side as well. But yes, the competition is expected to remain at least in the near term.

Yes, that makes sense. And I'm wondering just on the type of insurers you're running into. Is it traditional capital that has always been in the market? Or is it new capital coming in with maybe alternative backing that is creating all the competition right now?

No, no, no. It's pretty much all traditional. And a lot of it is coming from the larger carriers, both within the short-tail lines, the property and energy lines that we were just talking about as well as the reinsurance lines. I think the market is in a state where it has performed well now for several years in a row, by and large. And the market is sitting on a lot of excess capital that they're potentially pressuring themselves to feed. We don't put ourselves in a position like that. As you know, we've got the buyback program, and we're returning capital via special dividends as well. It's just -- it's all about that discipline and writing the business that makes sense and not putting yourself under pressure to go -- to move with the herd.

That's super helpful. And then I did want to talk about the capital. So in the past few years, you've done some M&A to reach into new markets. Is there any opportunity to do that here or multiples just not making sense?

At this point in time, I would say there's nothing really strong on our radar for any of that. I think you've got to be mindful at the same time of the market that we are in and what that means from a capital management and M&A perspective. We're just focused on our business. We're focused on -- as you know, I mean, if you look at our history, we're pretty much almost entirely a story of organic growth. And that is honestly how we prefer to do it.

We're always on the lookout for new opportunities, and I think there are growth opportunities for a company like IGI, both this year and in the years ahead despite the market being tougher. And we're out there fighting hard to find and capitalize on those opportunities. I'm confident we will. But the short answer to your question on the M&A side is nothing solid at the present time.

And then I did want to just try to squeeze one more in on the special dividend announcement this morning. Can you just walk through how you decide the size of the dividend versus buyback and your approach to capital management here?

I mean, by and large, the buyback is something that we're doing throughout the year, right? And a lot of it depends on what ability we have and how much of that we are able to buy. I mean in terms of the special dividend, I mean, when we announced our sort of new at the time capital strategy a few years ago, we said it was basically a focus on the business, underwriting first. Capital position was a lot weaker than what it is, of course, today. But we saw the opportunities at the time in the market. And we said that when we don't see those same opportunities and we don't feel we can feed that capital or need that capital, then we would return it to shareholders. And you started seeing that a couple of years ago from a dividend perspective.

Essentially, we want to make sure we are in a comfortable place from a capital adequacy perspective. Obviously, we've got the upgrade from S&P. That's a huge asset for us that needs protection. We always will. But we've had another fantastic year, generating just under $130 million of profit, growing book value. And the business from a top line perspective has not grown. And as a result, the required amount of capital where we stand hasn't increased, yet you've managed to grow the balance sheet in that regard.

So we tend to wait until the end of the year, see what the results are like, see what our capital position is like and then assess whether we are in a position to give back to shareholders. And if we are, then the amount that we are able to give back to ensure that our capital position remains strong, protecting all our interests, internal and external.

Best of luck in your 25th year.

The next question comes from Michael Phillips from Oppenheimer.

I apologize if any repeats, I was dropped for about 10 minutes here. So hopefully, no repeats. Congrats on the quarter. I guess, Waleed, I wanted to start with maybe just to what extent on the long-tail line business in the fourth quarter did you feel you had to walk away from business that didn't meet your hurdles more so than maybe you did earlier parts of the year?

To be totally honest...

And by the way, let me say this, I apologize. I'm asking not so much on the margins because you -- I think there's lots of confidence in your ability to maintain margins as the soft market maybe continues. But just maybe more so if you consciously walk away, what impact that might have on top line. So if you've already done that, should that continue?

I mean if there's -- thanks, Mike, for the question. The long-tail business has now been in a downward trajectory for a good 3 years plus now. So a lot of that sort of walking away from business. I mentioned on the call that we're seeing a leveling off in a sense or indications of a leveling off in the softening or in the rate reductions. And hopefully, what we'll see in 2026 is a bottoming out of that. Most of that walking away, we're pretty much done.

Now obviously, there's always going to be business here and there that you're going to walk away from. There's going to be new business that comes in. The impact that, that will have on the overall size of the portfolio, I don't think will be material in any shape or form, at least not negatively, once we're done with the PI portfolio that we walked away from. So you're going to continue to see in Q1 and Q2 of this year, the impact of the reduced premiums from the runoff of that portfolio. But we are replacing that with new business.

As I said on the call, we've got a good deal flow with good partners, and we're working hard to make those or to get those materialized. So I think once we're done with the runoff of that PI portfolio and the lost income you'll see in Q1 and Q2 of this year, then you'll see a much more stable and potentially positive trajectory for the long-tail portfolio.

Okay. And then -- I appreciate your comments on the G&A and your opening comments. I guess, some of the pressure on the quarter, obviously, was from the hires that you mentioned and the system build-out. Is that stuff done going forward? Are there any more additional pressure on the dollar amount in the next couple of quarters?

I would say that there will be, I think, more -- definitely more stability. Now this is a big chunk of our expenses are incurred in pounds, right? So if the pound does strengthen, there's nothing we can do about what that means and not a lot we can do about what that means and translates into dollars. So there are certain things that we've got to keep in mind.

Now I think if there's going to be growth from an HR perspective in terms of teams, et cetera, it's going to be more on the underwriting side. If we find new opportunities, bring in new teams to develop new portfolios, build out -- bring in new business, then we will not hesitate to spend the money on that.

I mean that being said, on the -- and I tried to address it and explain it in my own way on the call in my commentary. But I know I understand how, obviously, the combined ratio components of the G&A ratio, the acquisition cost ratio and then obviously, the loss ratio all come together, and we look at them individually, and we do very much so ourselves, 100%. The one thing I would say, though, is that as you -- depending on where you are in the market cycle, your strategy of underwriting, both underwriting the inwards business and then buying the reinsurance that you feel provides you with the optimum protection, right, is going to have an impact and distort some of these ratios depending on which stage you are in the cycle.

So if you notice, we're -- as I mentioned earlier, for example, now, we're buying a lot more facultative reinsurance, offloading elements of risk and exposure that we're happy to offload. And ultimately, what that does is it impacts your net earned premium numbers. But we're doing that very much knowing that, okay, maybe that may result in a higher expense ratio, right? But if it keeps that loss ratio, most importantly, under wrap or under control and helps to reduce and control that loss ratio, then overall, your combined ratio is still going to be healthy and still going to be good.

So it's pulling the different -- taking different actions at different times, pulling the different levers when you see you need to pull them that may distort a couple of numbers. But then overall, when it all comes together, which is the most important thing, when it all comes together, it still looks great.

No, that's perfect. Last one for me. You mentioned the construction business and infrastructure and data centers around the world. One of the things that I think we're seeing here in the U.S. is some of that stuff has been delayed and impacting some insurance companies' top line business. And I wonder if you've seen that in any parts of your construction business at all? Any concerns there?

Do you mean delay in starting the projects or delays in completion of the projects?

Well, both, probably more so on starting, but kind of both.

Yes. I think -- I mean, a lot of these projects, Mike, are quite chunky. The smallest projects in this area meaningfully is in the low single-digit billion sort of contract values. And we've seen projects upwards of $20 billion, depending on which part of the world we're talking about. And these types of projects always tend to take -- they'll come to the market and they take time to be finalized and completed. And you've got all stakeholders, bankers, financing sign off, and that does take time. We haven't -- I mean -- and so that's natural in our -- in the construction portfolio. What we haven't seen is projects being pulled, which -- so that's the positive sign.

So it might take time for them to actually get finalized. But all in all, I mean, this is a big, big -- and you hear everybody talking about. I mean you've seen other carriers go in quite heavily in facilities being set up, et cetera, et cetera, because it's no doubt a big area for everybody going forward.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for closing remarks.

Just want to say thank you to everyone for joining us today, and thanks for your continued support of IGI. As always, any additional questions, please contact Robin. She'll be happy to assist.

I wish you all a great day, and we look forward to speaking with you on next quarter's call. Thank you, everybody.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

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" Oppenheimer & Co. Inc., Research Division

Good day, and welcome to the International General Insurance Holdings Third Quarter and Nine-Month 2025 Financial Results Conference Call.

[Operator Instructions] Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Robin Sidders, Head of Corporate Relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Bailey, and good morning, and welcome to today's conference call. Today, we'll be discussing the financial results for the third quarter and the first nine months of 2025.

You will have seen our results press release, which we issued after the market closed yesterday. If you'd like a copy of the press release, it's available in the Investors section of our website.

We have also posted a supplementary investor presentation, which can be found on our website on the Presentations page in the Investors section. On today's call are Executive Chairman of IGI, Wasef Jabsheh; President and CEO, Waleed Jabsheh; and Chief Financial Officer, Pervez Rizvi. 

As always, Wasef will begin the call with some high-level comments before handing over to Waleed to talk through the key drivers of our results for the third quarter and the first nine months of 2025 and finish up with our views on the market conditions and outlook for the remainder of this year and the upcoming January 1, 2026, renewals.

At that point, we'll open the call up to Q&A. I'll begin with some customary safe harbor language. Our speakers' remarks may contain forward-looking statements. Some of the forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words. 

We caution you that such forward-looking statements should not be regarded as a representation by us that future plans, estimates, or expectations contemplated by us will, in fact, be achieved.

Forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions.

Actual events or results may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, including the risk factors set out in the company's annual report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2024, the company's reports on Form 6-K and other filings with the SEC, as well as our results press release issued yesterday evening. 

We undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they are made. During this conference call, we use certain non-GAAP financial measures.

For a reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures to the nearest GAAP measure, please see our earnings release, which has been filed with the SEC and is also available on our website. 

With that, I'll turn the call over to our Executive Chairman, Wasef Jabsheh.

Thank you, Robin, and good day, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's call. IGI once again delivered excellent results both for the third quarter and the first nine months of 2025.

We generated net income of $33.5 million and $94.9 million for the third quarter and first nine months, respectively. And this resulted in an annualized return on average equity of 20% for the third quarter and 19% for the first nine months of the year.

We continue to outperform and deliver superior results even in what is becoming a more competitive marketplace. We have consistently demonstrated our ability to perform well no matter where we are in the market cycle through focus, discipline, and consistent execution. 

That really is the hallmark of our strategy and why we have successfully managed the cyclicality of our business for well over two decades. Our value at IGI is in our ability to actively manage our capital so that we generate consistently high-quality returns in any stage of the market cycle.

So far, in 2025, in addition to strong earnings, our active capital management has resulted in us growing book value per share by almost 10% to $16.23 per share in the first nine months of the year and returning a total close to $100 million to shareholders in dividends and share repurchases. 

Before I hand over to Waleed, I want to congratulate all of our people at IGI on the tremendous news of our S&P financial grade upgrade to A with a stable outlook.

When we started writing business back in 2002, we were unrated. It was only three years later, in 2005, that we assigned our first rating of BBB from S&P.

To see how far we have come since the early days of IGI through sheer hard work and decision focus gives me immense pride. We have grown largely organically from $25 million of initial capital to almost $700 million in shareholders' equity. This is quite an achievement. 

I will now let Waleed discuss the numbers in more detail and talk about market conditions and our outlook for the remainder of the year, and I will remain on the call for any questions at the end. Waleed, please go ahead.

Thank you, Wasef, and good morning, everyone. Thank you all for joining us on today's call.

Just reiterating what Wasef emphasized at the beginning, we had an excellent third quarter with strong underwriting and investment performance, leading to a very solid bottom-line result.

As Wasef indicated, I mean, we're in our strongest position ever as we close out 2025 and look ahead into 2026 in what is becoming a more challenging environment.

But before I go through the numbers in detail, I'd like to highlight a couple of important points to begin with. First, as Wasef mentioned, the recent announcement from S&P that they've upgraded our financial rating to full A, I mean, this really is a fantastic achievement for us.

And while it's very difficult to quantify the short-term benefit, the upgrade undoubtedly will open more doors for us to new business and more clients and cedents as well.

Like Wasef, I'm also extremely proud of this outstanding achievement. And I congratulate all our teams on the strong track record and the foundation that we have built together at IGI.

I would note that this doesn't really change anything about the level of capital we hold. We've always held capital to the highest level of S&P's capital adequacy and confidence level requirements, and we'll continue to do so.

Second, you will have seen our announcement this morning that our Board has authorized a new $5 million common share repurchase authorization, now that we've exhausted the prior program of 7.5 million shares.

We view share repurchases as a strong value generation lever. And at current levels, we believe that repurchasing our shares is highly accretive and excellent value for our shareholders.

So as always, we're working with all the tools we have in our toolbox, and that's really what cycle management comes down to.

Now moving on to the results of the third quarter and the first 9 months. We'll start with the top line, where gross premiums written in Q3 were just over $131 million, reflecting a decrease of about 5%, driven by a slightly lower volume of GWP in our reinsurance segment and much more so in our long-tail segment.

And now this is a segment, as we've been saying for several quarters now. It's a segment where competitive pressures are more prevalent and where we also made a decision, as mentioned on last quarter's call, to non-renewal large PI account.

For the first 9 months, gross premiums were up marginally to just over EUR 525 million, and that was primarily driven by growth in the reinsurance segment and, to a lesser extent, the short-tail segment.

Net premiums earned were just under $115 million for Q3 versus just over $126 million for the same period last year. For the first 9 months, net premiums earned were $342.5 million versus $362.5 million for the previous year.

For the first 9 months of 2025, the net premiums earned included the impact of reinstatement premiums. We've mentioned on previous calls, reinstating premiums is are loss-affected business, mainly on losses incurred in the early part of the year, which amounted to just over $11 million.

I'll say again that we are strategic buyers of reinsurance to help mitigate really the volatility in some of the high-severity lines of business we write.

Combined ratio for Q3 was 76.5%, and that had the benefit of about 4.5 points of positive currency revaluation in the quarter due to the strengthening of the U.S. dollar.

The third quarter was also relatively benign from a large loss perspective. That's versus the 86% combined ratio for Q3 of last year. We noted the impact of currency revaluation on our results during last quarter's call as well as the previous quarter's call.

During Q3, the U.S. dollar strengthened against our major transactional currencies. So this had the opposite impact during the quarter than what it did during the first 2 quarters of the year when the U.S. dollar weakened.

The impact, however, during the third quarter is much less significant and much more immaterial.

For the first 9 months, the combined ratio was just over 87% with a combined ratio of just over 87% includes the negative impact of about 7.5 points of currency revaluation, which, as I said a moment ago, had a negative currency impact for the first 2 quarters, slightly offset by the positive one in the third quarter.

Again, as well as the lower volume of net premiums earned, from the reinsurance impact I mentioned earlier. This is versus an 80.5% combined ratio for the first 9 months of 2024.

All in, we delivered net income of $33.5 million per share for the quarter versus $34.5 million for the same period in 2024. That resulted in $0.75 for both quarters per share, net income of $0.75 per share.

For the first 9 months of the year, we generated net income of just under $95 million or $2.14 per share, versus just over $105 million or $2.31 per share for the first 9 months of last year.

The period-over-period decline in net income for the same reasons in the first 9 months results lower level of underwriting income due to the currency revaluation movements and again, the higher level of net reinstatement premiums paid on our outwards reinsurance programs.

Core operating income was $38.6 million or $0.87 per share in Q3, compared to $30.7 million or $0.67 per share for the same period the year before.

First nine months of '25 core operating income was just under $81 million or $1.82 per share, versus just under $104 million or $2.29 per share.

With the difference primarily attributable to the lower level of underwriting income, which for that period was negatively impacted by almost $24 million of currency revaluation movements, as well as heightened loss activity from the beginning of the year, which amounted to about 13.4 points of current accident year CAT losses in 2025.

Prior year development was favorable in Q3, amounting to about $10.5 million versus unfavorable development of $7 million for Q3 of 2024. For the first nine months, prior year development was favorable by $30 million versus $34.4 million for the same period last year, with the lower volume in 2025, primarily attributable to currency revaluation of about $20 million.

So on a constant FX basis, we would have seen favorable development of approximately $50 million for the first nine months of this year.

The G&A expense ratio was 21.3% and 20.5% for the third quarter and first nine months of '25, respectively, which, when compared to the same period in 2024, were just impacted by the lower level of net premiums earned.

A few comments on our segment results. I'll start with the short-tail segment. Gross premiums were up 2% in Q3, down 2.7% for the first nine months of the year when compared to the same periods in 2024.

Net premiums earned were down about 10.4% and 8.1% for Q3 and the first nine months of '25, respectively, compared to the same period last year.

The decline for the nine-month period reflects the lower level of written premiums as well as the impact of the reinstatement premiums on our reinsurance purchases.

Underwriting income was down 14.7% in Q3 versus the same period last year, largely due to the lower level of net premiums earned again. For the first nine months, underwriting income was just over $80 million, down 12% when compared to the first nine months of last year.

I mean, similar to what we said on last quarter's call, we continue to see new business opportunities in a number of lines, particularly engineering and construction, and marine lines, and to a lesser degree, contingency and property lines. Broadly speaking, pricing remains adequate.

Engineering, in particular, continues as a healthy growth opportunity with infrastructure projects and opportunities coming to many of our markets across the globe. And we're seeing a healthy pipeline of deal flow in this line of business, though competitive pressures are there.

The reinsurance segment, as we've said, is well diversified geographically and by business line, and generated gross written premiums of just over $11 million in Q3, slightly below the same period in the same quarter last year.

In the first nine months now Q3 is not a significant renewal quarter for us. So in the first nine months, which is a more accurate representation, gross written premium growth was almost 25% on the reinsurance segment to just under $98 million when compared to the same period in 2024.

Conditions generally remain strong, pricing adequate in the business that we write here. But as I'm sure you've heard from everybody else, there's increasing evidence of competitive pressures, which is also what I noted in my comments earlier.

Earned premium was generally flat in Q3 this year versus last year, but more than 21% in the first nine months of this year when compared to the same period last year.

Underwriting income was up 35% and almost 50% for Q3 and the first nine months of '25, respectively, when compared to the same period last year.

The significant increase in underwriting income in this segment reflects really the shift in focus, which we always talk about that we made a year ago to higher margin areas of the business, in this case, obviously, the reinsurance business, and we're now seeing this flow through the financial results.

Long-tail segment continues to be the area of our portfolio that has definitely been the most challenging for the past several years, with increasing competitive pressures and consistently declining rates and thus, obviously, margins, albeit from high levels.

We, as you can see in the numbers, have steadily contracted the book during that time. I mean, you'll recall on last quarter's call, we announced the decision to non-renewal a roughly $50 million GWP professional indemnity account where the profitability profile was simply not meeting our requirements, was out of step with our required threshold, and unlikely to improve in the near-term.

From a top-line perspective, this had some effect in the third quarter and resulted in a big chunk of the overall decrease in GWP in Q3. But the most significant top-line impact of this, which is roughly going to be about $25 million, will be seen in the fourth quarter of 2025.

And as we said on last quarter's call, the rest will be spread out over the first 2 quarters of next year. In the third quarter and first 9 months of '25, gross premiums in this segment were down 12.6% and 7.5%, respectively.

We recorded underwriting income of around $11.5 million for the third quarter versus an underwriting loss of $1 million for the same quarter last year.

For the first 9 months, we recorded underwriting income of $1 million versus just over $25 million for the same period in 2024. And as we mentioned in the first 2 quarters with the difference was largely due to the negative impact of currency revaluation movements, and that amounted to about $17.5 million in the first 9 months of the year.

The one thing I would say here is that the pace of rating decline continues to slow in the lines of business that we're writing. And whilst it would be a bit premature to predict any turnaround in these markets, we're hopeful that there will be signs of improvement in 2026 and into 2027.

Obviously, that comes with a big caveat.

Turning to the balance sheet. Total assets increased by just over 4% to $2.12 billion. Total investment cash was $1.32 billion. Our allocation to fixed income securities, which makes up approximately 80% of our investments in the cash portfolio, generated just over $13 million in investment income in Q3, which was flat in the same period in '24.

For the first 9 months, investment income increased just under 7% to $40.6 million with an average annualized yield of 4.2%. And we hedged out our duration slightly to 3.7 years during the quarter just to lock in higher rates on new bonds.

In Q3, we repurchased almost 800,000 common shares at an average price per share of $23.79. As of the end of Q3, we had exhausted the $7.5 million repurchase authorization.

And as I noted at the start of the call, we announced that our Board has approved a new repurchase authorization of 5 million common shares. Total equity was just under $690 million at the end of Q3, and that includes the impact of $53.8 million in share repurchases and the payment of just over $44 million in common share dividends, including the special dividend that we distributed earlier this year in April of $0.85.

This compares to the total equity of just under $655 million at the end of last year.

Ultimately, we recorded a return on average shareholders' equity of about 20% for the third quarter and about 19% for the first 9 months of 2025.

So from a total return perspective, we grew book value per share by almost 10% in the first 9 months up to September 30, and we returned a total of about $98 million to shareholders in share repurchases and dividends in that same period.

So all in, it was an excellent and great quarter and first 9 months of the year for us. Now turning to our outlook for the remainder of the year and the next major renewal period at 1/1, which is only a few weeks away now. The story is fairly similar to what we've said on last quarter's calls.

There's very clearly an elevated level of competitive pressure across much of the market. But I would characterize it mostly as orderly and quite disciplined up until now.

Given our size, our relative position in the market, the makeup of our portfolio, and the actions we've taken in recent years to enhance our visibility and our scope of offering, we're confident that we will continue to find opportunities to grow our portfolio, write new business.

Obviously, there are pockets where there's more pressure than others. But as we've always said, we have that ability to shift focus to those areas where we believe the best returns are going to be generated. And that's always part and parcel of how we conduct our underwriting business.

We continue to see rate adequacy across much of our portfolio. And I think with our strong network of relationships, we're continuing to pursue opportunities to enhance our distribution capabilities, and that will ultimately generate additional margin and add value to our proposition.

We're focusing on those lines and markets that remain healthier. And where necessary, we're reducing our exposures in areas where we can't generate an acceptable level of risk-adjusted return.

Again, all part and parcel of the dynamic cycle management required. I mean the benefit of our diversified strategy, both by line of business and geographical territory, means that we can still and will still find profitable opportunities to write new business across many lines and geographies within our portfolio.

I mean, we've done a good job of uncovering these opportunities, and I commend our underwriters for their efforts on really getting out there and working their relationships and pushing to find those opportunities.

And without a doubt, the rating upgrade from S&P will benefit us here and again; it surely will open doors for us and move us up the so-called league tables and what is acceptable security, which is critical, given where we are currently in the market cycle.

So the timing of this upgrade is not lost on us. And I would say it is particularly fortuitous. 

Having said all that, given that the market, broadly speaking, is softening, it would definitely be a reasonable assumption that we're likely to see some contraction in top line in certain areas of our portfolio where we decide to walk away from business that simply does not meet our embedded profitability and/or coverage targets. And that's the discipline we talk about so often. 

We've talked on prior calls about the strengthening of domestic markets across the world and the growing desire and the ability to retain business in those domestic and local markets.

Our strategy, as we've said all along, has our people with the required expertise, a specialist expertise situated in most major regions across the globe, which is a clear benefit when we're on the ground, have the ability to interact face-to-face, and understand the dynamics of how business is transacted in those local markets. 

I mean, if we look at specific segments of our portfolio, I'll start with the reinsurance lines. Margins here remain very healthy and carriers are mostly behaving, as I mentioned earlier, in a relatively disciplined manner from a structure, terms, and wording perspective.

Because of this, this is also where we're seeing the greatest push for market share. You may recall our recent announcement that we brought on board a seasoned London market specialty treaty underwriter last week, and this will complement our existing U.S. and international treaty team, while also developing our specialty treaty business with a focus on certain lines such as marine, energy, terror, PV, as well as aviation and cyber. 

This is where we've had a limited presence, and we haven't really had any dedicated resources to focus on these areas. And definitely, again, here, in particular, the S&P upgrade will help quite a bit.

Our short-tail portfolio, as you know, is traditional property, energy, marine books, as well as some other pure specialty and niche lines. That remains a bit of a mixed bag as it has been for several quarters now, and overall continues to be a little tougher than a year ago.

I mean, similar to reinsurance, where carriers tend to take big lines, the most significant pressures continue to be on property and energy, where the line sizes in those lines of business are, by nature, larger. 

We recently added senior talent to our property team focusing on the U.S., and we're adding to our energy team, specifically in downstream and power, and renewables. And that is a reflection of the opportunity we believe continues to be there in these lines of business. 

As I mentioned earlier, I mean, we continue to see healthy opportunities in some of the more specialist lines like construction and engineering, specifically some of the smaller projects in the U.S. and also in other regions like Asia Pac and the Middle East as well.

Elements of the marine book, cargo, in particular, continue to be steady and present new opportunities to us, especially in the niche segment of the cargo market that we focus on. 

Contingency has been a great line of business for us in a very bright spot. And you'll recall that we entered that market after COVID. And since then, we've built a market-leading book with an amazing team.

In our long-tail segment, net rates overall are still relatively adequate, but that adequacy is reducing as rates come down. But as I said earlier, the pace of rating decline continues to slow at a modest rate.

And again, I don't want to go out of the NIM here, but there are indications there may be some brighter news later in 2026 and in 2027. Again, this comes with a big caveat. 

The PI business, which is the largest portfolio in this segment, is, as we've said before, largely facilitized. But I mean, there's been a fair bit of talent movement here with underwriters moving or setting up shops.

And that with our relationships across this business, that's providing us some new opportunities and a good deal of flow, especially in the more niche segments of the PI market. 

In the geographic markets, I'll say a few words here. Again, a similar story as last quarter. The U.S., whilst competitive pressures are increasing, remains a big focus for us and presents probably one of the bigger opportunities for us to write new business, especially in our specialty treaty and short-tail portfolios.

I mean, simply also because of the sheer size of IGI compared to the sheer size of the market. 

We also remain focused on building our profile, as we've mentioned many times before, across Europe and growing the profile in the MENA region and Asia Pac markets.

As I mentioned earlier, they're all retaining more business locally, and we've got the network to capitalize on that. So our expanded presence and capabilities on the ground here will definitely continue to pay benefits. 

So we're clearly, I mean, at the stage of the broader cycle where portfolio and exposure management is critical. I mean, I cannot emphasize this enough, so I'll keep saying this again that we will not sacrifice the bottom line for the benefit of the top line.

It really is all about discipline right now. intelligent risk selection, paying attention to the small print, and being aware of what's going on around us. 

That's what the prudent management of the cycle and sound management of the cycle is all about. I mean, we're coming off 5 years of excellent profitability. And I say that not just about IGI, but the broader market as well.

It's not difficult, in all honesty, to do well during a hard market. But good underwriters don't just do well in hard markets. They do well throughout any and all stages of the cycle. 

And that is what we have at IGI, and that is the talent we attract and retain, and that is the discipline we exercise. We have the right strategy and the right footprint.

We've built great teams and put the right people in the right places, and we've built a very solid foundation, a very well-diversified portfolio, particularly given our size. 

And all this is backed by a fully unlevered and solid balance sheet. We have a proven track record, and IGI's visibility in the market has improved dramatically over the last few years. That is what's earned us our recent upgrade, and that is what gives us the resilience to succeed throughout market cycles. 

So, rest assured, we'll continue doing what we do best, which is to focus on generating superior value for the long term with a razor-sharp focus on underwriting profitability, quality, and bottom line.

I'm going to pause here, and we're going to turn it over for questions. So, operator, we're ready to take the first question, please.

[Operator Instructions]

The first question comes from Michael Phillips with Oppenheimer.

Well, I always appreciate all your comments on the market conditions. I guess another good quarter on the margin side, you're fighting the tape that the industry is fighting on the top line.

I guess with that, on the long-tail side of your business, the segment there, can you talk about are you closer to the point with rates declining? 

I think you said in your ending comments there that the pace of decline is starting to slow; maybe it's not good news. But are you closer to the point where the nonrenewal account that you did last quarter? I know you constantly look at that.

Are you close to the point where there might be others that are not meeting your threshold that you kind of have to walk away from?

Michael Phillips, thanks for the question. The simple answer is no. That book of business that we walked away from had its particular characteristics and segment that you can simply isolate in terms of the niches and the behavior of the market in that regard.

So outside of that, no, there isn't anything on our screens that we are contemplating walking away from. If anything, we're identifying other segments of the PI market. 

As I mentioned on the call, people moving shops, wanting support, whilst I can't go into lots of details at the moment, but these are underwriters that we know very well, have some of the strongest track records in the market, understand their businesses inside out, and are looking for support. 

We're trying to capitalize on those opportunities where we can access portfolios of businesses that we deem extremely healthy that can more than make up, especially on a net written premium basis, can more than make up for the PI account that we walked away from.

I guess maybe turn to the reinsurance segment for a second. There, it seems like we're getting closer to 1/1 renewals here. And as you said, year-to-date, you're up, and the third quarter is not a big renewal period for you. 

But as you look at the beginning of the year here, do you think that there's going to be more pressure on the top line for your reinsurance book than what you've seen in 1Q each quarter each year for the past couple of years has been pretty strong. This quarter this year might challenge that. I guess what are your thoughts on reinsurance if we enter 1/1?

I mean, listen, Q1 this year was strong. Q1 last year and the year before were very, very strong because we were in a different stage within the cycle for the reinsurance market.

There's no doubt about that. Is that going to continue? Of course, it's not going to continue because you're seeing pressure coming in, where, following a very benign wind season this year, we've got less than 2 months left in the year. 

If barring any major events in that time period and ahead of discussions and negotiations for the 1/1 business, the market is going to generate another great set of results, generate excess capital, and that's going to put pressure on feeling that capital. Is Hunger going to increase as we stand today at 1/1? I have no doubt that it will. 

One thing that you need to take into consideration, number one, we're adding the specialty bit. So that's a new source or relatively new source of income for IGI.

And number two, our book is so diverse by business line, by geography. It's not your traditional large reinsurer type portfolio, not your traditional European reinsurance portfolio, traditional Bermudan reinsurance portfolio, or U.S. reinsurance portfolio. 

So, we've got a lot of levers to pull here. And we've said this before, and I'll say it again, Mike, ultimately, this is not a top-line game. We are in this for underwriting quality, underwriting profitability.

And I think I recall a comment I said to you a couple of quarters ago, I'd rather write a $700 million book generating 80% combined ratio rather than $1 billion book generating a 90% or 95% combined ratio. 

We are underwriters, plain and simple. We manage the cycle. But I do see runway for us in reinsurance, definitely, as we, would you call it, enter into new areas, not just in specialty, but others. We've got a team across the globe, honestly, that pretty much understands what they're doing. 

And you can see that in the results. We put emphasis on reinsurance a couple of years ago, and we said that's where the area where we think the healthiest returns will be generated. And as you're seeing now, that's exactly what's happening.

And I'm glad you reminded me of the quote that you gave a couple of quarters ago. That was one of my favorite quotes all the time. You'd rather focus on the bottom line, and you guys do that. I guess, given your comments, your reinsurance book, as you said, is not traditional large reinsurance. 

So maybe just lastly, to the extent you can comment on industry comment here, in the U.S., we're hearing a mixed story. Some reinsurers are saying that large account property has reached a floor and will start to improve from here.

Others are saying, heck, a way, it's still going to continue to decelerate from here on large account property in the U.S. I don't know if you have any perspective on that or not. I appreciate it. 

By large account property, you mean risk covers or cat covers?

Risk covers, yes.

Risk covers.

I don't think it's bottoming out, to be totally honest with you. That's not what we're seeing.

But again, that's not an area we play in hugely, especially on a reinsurance basis. But I think the hunger will continue to be there at 1/1. I don't anticipate things turning in the opposite direction in that area. But again, I would say I'm not the best person to answer that question.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks.

Just some final words. Again, thank you for joining us today. Thank you all for your continued support of IGI.

If you have any questions, as always, you can contact Robin, and she'll be happy to assist. And we look forward to speaking to you on next quarter's call. In the meantime, I wish everybody a Merry Christmas and happy holidays. I know it's a bit early, and happy New Year to all. Thank you.

The conference has now concluded. You may now disconnect.