Date: January 22, 2018
IronRock Insurance Company Limited (ROC), for the year ended December 31, 2018 posted gross premium of $571.84 million relative $424.46 million; this represents a 35% increase. While for the fourth quarter gross premium was $190.33 million, a 14% increase when compared to $167.19 million for the corresponding quarter of 2017.
Change in gross provision for unearned premiums amounted to $321.71 million compared to $270.29 million in 2017. Excess of loss premium totalled $35.14 million relative to $25.77 million in the previous year. As a result, gross insurance premium revenue amounted to $214.99 million relative to $128.40 million in 2017, a 67% increase year over year. For the quarter gross insurance premium revenue rose $14.53 million or 21% to $85.05 million (2017: $70.52 million).
Net insurance premium revenue amounted to $184.22 million, relative to $78.01 million in 2017, following net unearned premium adjustment of $30.78 million (2017: $50.40 million).
Commission expense totalled $60.02 million in contrast to 2017’s $31.46 million, while commission income grew by 97% from $33.63 million to total $66.31 million.
In addition, the company booked a net claims of $83.84 million relative to $46.83 in 2017 for the year.
Operating expenses for the period increased to $150.61 million relative to $134.74 million in the prior year. As such underwriting loss improved over the year closing at $43.94 million versus a loss of $101.38 million in 2017.
Investment income increased from $30.74 million to $32.22 million in 2018. Profit on sale of investment amounted to $3.16 million compared to $24.09 million in 2017. Foreign exchange gain amounted to $8.37 million compared to a FX loss of $1.31 million in 2017, while other income soared to $1.00 million (2017: $4,000).
As a result, profit for the year totalled $811,000 compared to a loss of $47.86 million in 2017 an improvement year over year. For the fourth quarter, the company booked profits amounting to $8.37 million relative to gains of $12.63 million reported in 2017.
Earnings per share for the year totalled $0.004 (2017: LPS: $0.24); while EPS for the quarter was $0.04 (2017: $0.06). The numbers of shares used in the calculations are 214,000,000.00 units. The stock price as at January 21, 2019 was $4.90.
According to ROC, “The improvement in IronRock’s performance has been driven by extremely good results in our insurance portfolio, as evidenced by the profit commissions mentioned earlier and very low loss ratios in our Motor and Liability classes. These results demonstrate the success of management’s approach to underwriting, risk selection and pricing.”
Balance Sheet Highlights:
As December 31, 2018, assets totalled $1.02 billion (2017: $937.77 million) increasing by a 8%. Investments contributed to this increase in the asset base by $153.98 million or 55%.
Shareholder’s equity closed at $512.75 million (2017: $512.34 million). This resulted in a book value per share of $2.39 (2017: $2.40).
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