Earnings Labs

American International Group, Inc. (AIG)

Q3 2016 Earnings Call· Thu, Nov 3, 2016

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Please stand by. Good day, and welcome to AIG's Third Quarter Financial Results Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Liz Warner. Please go ahead ma'am.

Elizabeth A. Werner - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Before we get started, I'd like to remind you that today's presentation may contain forward-looking statements which are based on management's current expectations, and are subject to uncertainty and changes in circumstances. Any forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance or events. Actual performance and events may differ, possibly materially from such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause this include the factors described in our first, second and third quarter Form 10-Q, and our 2015 Form 10-K under Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Conditions and Results of Operations, and under Risk Factors. AIG is not under any obligation and expressly disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Today's presentation may contain non-GAAP financial measures, the reconciliation of such measures to the most comparable GAAP figures is included in the slides for Jay's presentation and for – and our financial supplement, which are available on our website. Nothing in today's presentation or in oral statements made in connection with this presentation is intended to constitute nor shall it be deemed to constitute any offer of any securities up for sale or a solicitation of an offer to purchase any securities in any jurisdiction. This morning, we will get to hear from our management team and – which would include Peter Hancock, Sid Sankaran, Rob Schimek and Kevin Hogan. And we'll begin this morning's call with Peter.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Liz, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased with our progress this quarter and the continued execution of our strategic plan. We reported third quarter operating EPS of $1 a share, a solid result despite volatility from our review of our longevity assumptions and certain segments of our Commercial business. I'm pleased that we maintained our strong position in our Life and Retirement segments, and delivered another strong quarter in Personal Insurance. I remain highly focused on the continued improvement of our commercial underwriting, and believe we're taking appropriate actions. Sid and Rob will speak to the specifics of our reserves and underwriting strategy in their remarks. Since the second quarter, we announced or completed five strategic and complex transactions. These actions are increasing the sustainability of AIG's earnings and are reshaping the company. During our January strategy update, we discussed our focus on targeting geographies and segments with critical mass and expertise, while improving our multinational capabilities. The Fairfax transaction is the most recent example of executing on this strategy. The transaction required the extraordinary effort of our employees across two continents, 12 countries, and required the close and timely coordination with over 20 different regulators. The transaction is expected to consolidate our network partners, and reinforce our commitment to servicing our multinational clients in over 200 countries and jurisdictions without the need for bricks and mortars in every location. As we committed to you in January, we are narrowing our focus on those countries where we have opportunities to improve our ROE. We're also highly focused on disruption in the market and our future growth opportunities. During the third quarter, we announced the launch of our technology-driven solution to serve the $80 billion U.S. small-to-middle-market. AIG, Hamilton Insurance and Two Sigma joined together to form Attune. Attune…

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. This morning, I'll speak to our quarterly financial results including noteworthy items, strategic transactions and capital management. Turning to slide four, our core operating earnings improved from the same period last year as the decline in the Commercial accident year loss ratio has adjusted, expense discipline across AIG and improved alternative investment returns all meaningfully contributed to the improvement in performance. Looking ahead, while we're only one month into the fourth quarter, our early estimate of losses from Hurricane Matthew is about $250 million, roughly two-thirds of which relates to Commercial and one-third relates to Consumer. Operating results also reflected two adverse impacts of note. First, we took a loss recognition charge of $622 million related to longevity experience studies, which indicated increased longevity, particularly on disabled lives on a legacy block of structured settlements underwritten pre-2010. This legacy block accounted for over 80% of the $622 million charge. As we told you on our January 26 strategy update, these assets and liabilities will be reported in the legacy portfolio when we release our fourth quarter recast of results. Shifting to our operating portfolio actuarial updates, we recorded net charges totaling $24 million. We recorded a benefit of $238 million for our operating Consumer Life and Retirement businesses due largely to lower fixed annuity surrender assumptions, partially offset by an increase in reserves for universal life with secondary guarantees. Offsetting this, we recorded $262 million of total prior-year adverse reserve development net of premium adjustments, which largely related to our U.S. program business within specialty. Rob will comment further on this review and the underwriting actions that we've taken on our U.S. program book. During the quarter, we announced the sale of UGC to Arch Capital Group, and have included an overview of…

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Sid, and good morning, everyone. During the third quarter, we remained focused on our strategy to improve underwriting results and create a stronger, more valuable Commercial Insurance business. Our strategy recognizes the importance of managing both the adjusted accident year loss ratio and expense ratio, and this quarter we saw improvement in both. We will have quarterly variability in each component of the adjusted accident year combined ratio, but we expect the net result will continue to improve. Turning to slide 14. The adjusted accident year loss ratio declined 1.9 points during the third quarter, reflecting continued improvement in U.S. casualty. The UGC quota share agreement contributed to the improvement over prior year by 0.4 points in the third quarter or 0.3 points year-to-date. Moving to expenses. The 1.9 point expense ratio improvement exceeded the prior-year quarter despite lower net premiums earned. We expect expenses to continue to decline, but similar to the loss ratio, the expense ratio will fluctuate around a downward trend line. Globally, rates were down less than a point with a marginal increase in the U.S. and more aggressive competition internationally. In the U.S., casualty rates increased 3.5 points, representing the fourth consecutive quarter with rate increases in excess of three points, and specialty rates increased 2.5 points. Partially offsetting those increases was continued pressure in property of approximately four points driven primarily by excess and surplus lines. In certain segments, we're seeing fewer high-quality new business opportunities, and therefore, have maintained our discipline as we deploy our capital where we will meet or exceed our targeted rate of return. We're pleased that we continue to grow in our focus growth segments year-to-date despite competitive market conditions. In prioritizing our valued multiline client relationships, retention for major clients has remained consistent with prior levels…

Kevin T. Hogan - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you, Rob, and good morning, everyone. Despite a challenging economic and regulatory environment, I'm pleased to report that each of our consumer insurance businesses performed well during the quarter, reflecting the benefits of our diversified portfolio of Retirement, Life and Personal Insurance businesses. Importantly, each of our businesses is executing on our strategic priorities and are focused on value creation, as I will discuss. First, let me make a few introductory comments. In Retirement, I am proud to say that our strong diversification has made AIG the largest provider of annuities in the U.S. in the first half of the year. While we hold a top five sales ranking in each of variable index and fixed annuities, and we are the only company to hold a top five sales ranking in more than any one of these lines, our focus is on value over volume, and we continue to maintain vigorous pricing discipline facilitated by our lack of dependence on any one product. In Personal Insurance, we continue to execute on our focused strategy. We are on track to meet our target state of 15 individual and 35 group countries by the end of 2017, and the most recent announcement with Fairfax Financial is a further key step to achieving our goal. The benefits from these actions are beginning to emerge and will continue to evolve over the coming years. Most importantly, we are preserving our ability to serve our multinational customers and covered individuals through our strategic network partners. In U.S. Personal Insurance, our private client group is implementing a market-competitive end-to-end platform to build on the double-digit growth that we've been generating, which will further improve the customer and distributor experience, and create operational efficiencies through automation and self-servicing. In Japan, we remain focused on transforming the…

Elizabeth A. Werner - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Thank you. And in this morning, we'd like to follow format of one question with one follow-up, please, and then just get back into queue. We would like to open our lines up at this time, operator, for Q&A.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And we'll take our first question from Jay Cohen with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Jay Arman Cohen - Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc.: I just want to ask about the reserve charge in the Program business. You talked about doing sort of a deeper dive into that business this quarter. I guess the assumption that we had was that you had done a pretty deep dive into everything at year-end 2015. So, my question is, are there still other businesses that you need to dive in a little deeper to?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Jay, it's Rob. From an underwriting perspective, as you know – so I'll comment on underwriting and let Sid comment about reserves. But from an underwriting perspective, the way we'll drive our 6-point improvement in the adjusted accident year loss ratio is by digging deeper into all elements of the Commercial portfolio focused on the value of our volume exercises. So, in 2016, this is one of the areas where we focused, and consistent within actions you've already seen us take this year, the fact that we terminated 16 programs is very consistent with the actions we took with respect to our Environmental Solution Legal Liability business in the U.S. and Canada earlier this year, and the buffer trucking where, what we believe that a business is not a business that will add value to AIG. We've proved that we're willing to step away from it. I'll let Sid comment about the reserves.

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Jay, I think as we've said before, we review all of our reserve segments annually so actually in 2015 programs was reviewed midway through the year. We did not observe any significant adverse claim activity, which is important to know. Now, during the first half of 2016, as Rob noted, and I think the team did an excellent job on a deep dive underwriting review, we noted calendar year loss emergence for the most recent accident years that indicated we need to strengthen the program reserves. So, that's really the backdrop on Programs. Jay Arman Cohen - Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc.: Got it. The other question was on the direct marketing expense which came down quite a bit. Did you see those reductions have any impact on revenue production?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Jay, our change in strategy in direct marketing primarily focus on Japan, where you may recall we made an announcement about a year ago that we were teasing (30:34) direct marketing in the American Home business and focusing that activity in our Life Insurance platform, Fuji Life, in Japan. So we have seen a reduction in the production in the supplemental health business in American Home in Japan concomitant with that reduction in direct marketing expenses, and we are focusing on independent distribution channels in terms of new business in Japan. Jay Arman Cohen - Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc.: Got it. Thanks so much.

Operator

Operator

And the next question is from Michael Nannizzi with Goldman Sachs. Michael Nannizzi - Goldman Sachs & Co.: So, with those reserve points addressed, I guess, one question I had is on the underlying combined – as the underlying profitability in your four, sort of, subsegments. So 70% of your business, International consumer in North America, Commercial did okay this quarter, where the other 30%, which is International Commercial and North America consumer, did really poorly at these versus our estimates. And this isn't the first time those two areas have shown difficulty. So, what is adequate profitability in those segments? What you doing to get there? And how long is it going to take? And would you consider selling pieces or all of those businesses if parts of them that remain challenged aren't able to remediate?

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Mike, I'll take that. I think that the way you're segmenting the business is not the way we run the business. And so we try to make very clear in our January strategy update our forward-looking segmentation to help you think about valuation and adequate profitability as you put it in two broad segments – Legacy and Operating. And within the Operating, that helps you estimate what our sustainable ROE will be, and hence, what kind of our multiple on earnings you think we might deserve. And in the Legacy, I think it's very clear that sizable chunk of equity is – about a quarter of the company's equity at the beginning of this year had a very suboptimal return, about 3% return on equity. And therefore, as you get to understand the Legacy better, you figure out what kind of discount to the current book value you need as to anchor your valuation from. So, I'm feeling really good right now about the returns on the aggregate of all of our operating businesses with a forward-looking basis, and I think the big question mark is how quickly and at how big a discount to book value we can divest or reinsure the legacy book? And I think getting into the subsegments as you have, I don't think it's a practical way. When we're looking at divestitures, it's very focused on the Legacy and focused on the most efficient way to cleanse the earnings picture with those sub-standard returns so that we can focus our energy on a sustainable return on the operating business. So I think that's the way we look at it. And I don't know if there are any detailed comments on the segments that either Rob or Kevin would like to make.

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

So, Mike, it's Rob. I'll just make a couple quick thoughts. First of all, as it relates to the adjusted accident year loss ratio in Commercial, I'll just restate I'm absolutely confident that we're making the important changes that we've got to make to deliver on our commitment to improve the loss ratio by 6 points. And I probably would point to four quick observations. First, we've absolutely demonstrated the willingness to reduce our premium ratings as we retain the business that we think is important for us to remain focused on our valued client segments. But we've been doing this very consistently throughout the year. You can see that our premium volume in the first nine months of the year is down 16%, including, of course, the effective reinsurance. The second point that I'd make is that, as we show on page 16 of the presentation, the accident year loss ratio dispersion chart shows that we're driving improvements in the mix of business in a very material way. And to put this in context for you, the Remediate and Improve portions of our portfolio have declined by one-third on a dollar basis, from $7.5 billion of premiums in the first nine months of 2015 to $5.1 billion of premium in the first nine months of 2016, showing that where we're reducing premiums is in the Remediate and Improve portions of the portfolio. Actually, in the Grow and Maintain portions of the portfolio, Product Set 1 and Product Set 2A, our premium volume is approximately flat. It's down just about 2%. I'm going to turn it to Kevin for anything further.

Kevin T. Hogan - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think across the board in Personal Insurance, we've actually enjoyed quite strong margin expansion, including in North America. And in fact, our adjusted combined ratio has improved from 95.9% last year to 92.4% this year, which may be seeming, however, in the loss ratio is that in the third quarter, whilst we have quite a bit of consistency quarter-to-quarter, there is a little bit of volatility. We did have a number of losses that were large, over 2 million, but not quite at the severe level in the third quarter, whereas in the first two quarters, there were really an absence of those. So year-to-date, frankly, we are pretty much where we had expected to be in terms of the loss ratio. Consistent with what we've done in the rest of Personal Insurance, in the North American portfolio, we have worked hard on remediating certain areas of the business, including particularly the warranty, which process is now complete. And we're seeing quite a strong growth in our Private Client Group business, which is one of our leading businesses. So we're quite comfortable with the direction we're going in PI, including the very strong North American franchise. Michael Nannizzi - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. And then maybe, Sid, if I could follow up on your capital management comments. You said that we're seeing the disposition dollars are adding up, but you said, or at least the presentation implied, that you have further confidence in the $25 billion. Sort of adding up all the pieces, I would seem to get above that number. Can you help us reconcile those two points?

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Well, I think if you go back to the funding page that we shared with you back in January, we see ourselves as on track on each of those buckets in the funding page. Clearly, from a divestiture standpoint, you can see what we've done both on legacy sales where I think the team, Charlie and the team, have done a great job. And then we have a slew of transactions that are in the process of closing. Once we get to our process of closing transactions, we'll redo our capital plan and proceed at that point. But right now, I think the best way we could put it is we remain confident in our targets. Michael Nannizzi - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. Thanks.

Operator

Operator

So we'll take the next question from Kai Pan with Morgan Stanley. Kai Pan - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Good morning. Thank you. The first question on the commercial loss ratio reduction on page 16. You see the mix shifting towards the grow and the maintain buckets, but if you'll look at underlying loss ratio for these two buckets you are trying maintain and grow, is actually increasing year over year. I just wonder what's the dynamics there? I just wonder would that basically will increase that, but the loss ratio increase offset some of the improvement you're making in the other two buckets.

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

So, Kai, a couple things. First of all, I think the main message on page 16 is that we're driving our improvement by improving the mix of business. So if you look at products that, 1 and 2, while I would love to retain my loss ratio as low as possible, overall the loss ratio is increased by 3 points overall for products at 1 and 2, from 54% in 2015 to 57% for the first nine months of 2016. So you've got actual market conditions which will be whatever the rate changes are in the market. So as you might imagine, it will be pretty competitive in that space. And second, whenever we do an update to our reserves, we don't wait to make changes to our loss picks. And so to the extent that we have updated our reserve reviews, we've already reflected an increase in our loss pick for product set 1 and 2, where those reserve reviews have been completed. I would note that in product set 2B and 3, where the loss ratio has come down from 79% down to 73% over the first nine months of the year, the main observation I'd drive for you there is that's not because anybody gave me lower loss picks; that's being driven by the fact that we've really fundamentally changed the mix of business and been able to cut out some very poor performing parts of the portfolio. Kai Pan - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: That's great. My follow-up question is on the divestiture of UGC. Looks like, given the current run rate of earnings for that book, you're probably going to lose more than $500 million pre-tax earnings next year. And how do you plan to offset that, including maybe increasing buybacks to offset the EPS impact?

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Well, I think we've disclosed for you that one of the important elements of the transaction is in retaining the quota share, which we view as very valuable and has about $150 million of net income to us. So we view that as critical to looking at how we're managing the overall portfolio.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

I would just frame this as, we've got the Legacy portfolio with very low ROE businesses, which we are focused on divesting going forward. This was a business with a very high ROE that we felt would be more valuable in somebody else's hands than ours and improved our risk profile, so we're very much focused on value. The aggregate of the sale price and the reinsurance and the DTA makes this a very attractive net price to us based on any future outlook for that industry, and so the offsetting aspects of earnings dilution through buybacks and redeployment of that capital into other lines of business, is also, in our view, going to improve the quality of earnings to a less cyclical mix. There are many other ways we can obtain exposure to the U.S. housing market on the left-hand side of our balance sheet, which could more than make up for any kind of risk-adjusted earnings that we give up by the sale of UGC. Kai Pan - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Thank you so much.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Josh Shanker with Deutsche Bank.

Josh D. Shanker - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Yeah, thank you for taking my question. I guess this is for David (sic) [Rob] (42:41). In the past commentary you said that you had 1.9% loss ratio improvement.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

I'm sorry, Josh, who are you directing the question to?

Josh D. Shanker - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

I'm sorry, to Rob. You saw 1.9% loss ratio improvement in the Commercial segment based on better underwriting although it seems a lot of that was due to lower severe losses. Although at the same time there were a lot of severe losses in 3Q. So my question is: A, if you think about all the losses that occurred in 3Q last year, would you have had exposure? And, B, do you feel that there's more of a run rate – that a severe loss exposure of AIG has gone down in this re-underwriting process?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Josh, thanks for your question. So let me maybe break this into two components for you. As I think about our longer tail lines, casualty and financial lines, absolutely the 2016 third quarter was better performing than the 2015 third quarter, and even if you remove the fact that we had some increases in the loss picks for healthcare, for example, in the third quarter of last year. So we are simply improving the underwriting performance of the longer tail lines of business. With respect to the shorter tail lines of business, as you commented, there was a better result in severe losses. I also want to point you to the fact that we did announced earlier this year that we purchased a reinsurance program designed to limit some of that volatility in severe losses, and had you apply to that treaty, that reinsurance program to 2015, you would have a lower level of severe losses, even in 2015 using the reinsurance program that we put in place this year. So I think that for sure, there are improvements in the underwriting in the long tail lines. And while there's some volatility in the short tail lines, we had, in fact, made improvements in underwriting, and you have purchased reinsurance in a different way.

Josh D. Shanker - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

So you've never told us what's the budgeted number of severe loss units (44:57) in the new budget would be, but we should assume that going forward AIG's exposure to those severe man-made losses is lower than it was in 2015 or 2014?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

That way it works, Josh, is that the reinsurance that we purchased has an attachment point. So if there were severe losses, a high frequency of severe losses below the attachment to our reinsurance, then yes we could have an elevated level of severe losses. But generally speaking, our expectation is that our purchase of reinsurance will in fact reduce the level of severe losses moving forward.

Josh D. Shanker - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Deutsche Bank

Okay. Well, excellent answer. Thank you for it, and good luck.

Operator

Operator

And the next question is from Brian Meredith with UBS.

Brian Meredith - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS

Yes. Thanks. The first question, I'm just curious, Rob, in the adjusted loss ratio for Commercial lines this quarter, how much was current in your development in that loss ratio you said that you adjusted loss picks in the program business?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, I gave that answer in my prepared remarks. That was 1 point, Brian.

Brian Meredith - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS

Sorry. That was 1 point in the loss ratios. Thank you.

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

That's correct.

Brian Meredith - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS

And then, second question, Peter, I'm just curious if I look at your financial targets for 2016, as you commented, all of them pretty much getting close to there except for that book value growth. Maybe we can talk a little bit about why you're not achieving. Is there anything that you kind of learned this year that may make it challenging to meet that type of a target for 2017 as well?

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Well, I mean, I think that this year we had some somewhat unusual accounting asymmetries, which have given us a bit of a headwind in addition to some of the other dynamics, but in particular, one, that was sizable, was the asymmetry or the treatment of the significant change in the sterling exchange rate, which impacted the adjusted book value that we're targeting...

Brian Meredith - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS

Right.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

...but had an equal and offsetting gain in AOCI. So on a net basis, it's over $1.2 billion, I think, is that right, Sid?

Kevin T. Hogan - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, so, Brian, actually we've included an exhibit on page 25 of the conference call presentation which really shows that on the book value per share side we view our growth year-to-date as in the ballpark of 8%, excluding the impact of market volatility. We talked about loss recognition today on legacy structured settlements. The change in reserve discount, which also impacts it...

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah.

Kevin T. Hogan - American International Group, Inc.

Management

...as well as some of the non-operating items that Peter mentioned, like the Brexit FX issues. So we think we're on a solid trajectory on book value per share growth at this point in time.

Brian Meredith - UBS Securities LLC

Analyst · UBS

Great. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Ryan Tunis with Credit Suisse. Ryan J. Tunis - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Hey. Thanks. Good morning. I just had a follow-up on the six points of targeted accident year loss ratio improvement out to the end of 2017. Is that exclusive of the help that the loss ratio is currently getting from the UGC quota share?

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yes. Ryan J. Tunis - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Okay. Understood. And then my follow-up was actually on the reserve release and annuities. And I guess intuitively, I would've thought that lower surrenders in an annuities business would be a bad thing just given where interest rates are. Could you just help us understand why that results in a favorable item?

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Ryan, it's Sid. I assume you're asking about the DAC locking on fixed annuities... Ryan J. Tunis - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Correct. Yeah.

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Think about it as lower lapses mean people persist longer, which means there's more absolute dollars of income over time, which then creates the DAC unlocking. Ryan J. Tunis - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Okay. Thank you. And then I guess my last one just quickly was I noticed you moved some new lines in the runoff. So, I mean, I guess I asked the question on the quota share. What's the impact of some of the lines that you moved into runoff on the loss ratio this quarter? In other words, how would it have looked if you didn't move some of those lines into the runoff segment?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah. So, Ryan, it's Rob. We do not – we did not move business into runoff out of Commercial. And to be clear, for example, when we've exited business like Programs, that business that we've exited will continue to run off through my results and not help me until it has been fully earned in the Commercial loss ratio. So that creates a headwind for me. With that headwind, we still reaffirm the fact that because we've been able to terminate that business, that by the end of 2017, we do expect we'll deliver all six points of the loss ratio. Let me ask Sid to comment further.

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, Ryan, it's Sid. I think the last time we had a move of items into runoff was in Q1, so you can look back to Q1. The only item of note, I believe, in this quarter is if you look in our financial supplement, we split out the UGC quota share that Rob has talked about to be fully transparent. Ryan J. Tunis - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker): Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Elyse Greenspan with Wells Fargo.

Elyse B. Greenspan - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst · Wells Fargo

Hi. Thank you. Good morning. I just wanted to talk a little bit more about the Commercial line's underlying margin. You did point out about two points from property losses and also from the program adverse development of the current year. As we – and so that you've – as we think about the casualty and the specialty books, I guess, within Commercial, how did those books do sequentially on an underlying loss ratio basis when we compare to the Q2?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, so specialty, excluding programs, had a higher loss ratio in the third quarter of 2016 relative to Q2, and also relative to the third quarter of the prior year. The areas of specialty that would have been higher loss ratios would – the single biggest one for the quarter was actually aerospace and that's a short tail line. But I'll point to aerospace, and then as it relates to – relative to prior year, of course, it's environmental as we've exited some business that will continue to run off. As it relates to casualty, we've had much better results. The casualty result is more than three points better in the third quarter of 2016 than it was in the third quarter of 2015, and in part because we've got the reinsurance in place that will continue to earn in with increasing momentum across the course of the year. The benefit of that is better in Q3 than it was in Q2, and it will be better in Q4 than it was in Q3.

Elyse B. Greenspan - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst · Wells Fargo

Okay. Great. And then in terms of the capital return plan, we did see a little bit of a sequential slowdown in the Q3, but the – it seems like the liquidity at the holding company did go up in the quarter. So as you think about Q4, I guess we should see a view towards an uptick there given when some of the divestitures and cash came into the company. And then also if you can comment, Sid, on the expected cash dividend from the operating companies in the Q4, if possible. Thank you.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

So, Elyse, I'll start with the first point, which is, yes, you're right, we did slow buybacks in the third quarter because we had two factors in the back of our minds. One, it's tax season and so we wanted to make sure that we were very well prepared for any uncertainty on catastrophes. And secondly, there were a number of transactions as we – I talked about, over five sizable transactions that – signed in the quarter, and we wanted to make sure that we got them over the finish line before we dialed it up. In the fourth quarter, I think it's a good assumption to assume that there'll be a higher pace of buybacks, somewhat constrained by daily trading volumes. And as we look forward, while liquidity is one dimension that calibrates the pace of buybacks, it's only one. We also look at capital, we look at fixed charge coverage ratio, and we are very committed to maintaining an extremely strong balance sheet because that is a core part of our promise to our clients. So I don't know, Sid, if you want to comment further on that.

Siddhartha Sankaran - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Yeah, on the final question, Elyse, on dividends and tax share payments, we never comment on specific quarters. But if you go back to my earlier comments, we look very much on track of our window here in terms of the free cash flow generated from our subsidiaries. We have, I think, one of the strongest track records here in terms of free cash flow generation across our operating subs.

Elyse B. Greenspan - Wells Fargo Securities LLC

Analyst · Wells Fargo

Okay. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

The next question is from Larry Greenberg with Janney.

Larry Greenberg - Janney Montgomery Scott LLC

Analyst · Janney

Good morning and thank you. I just have a general question on service levels and how you maintain those service levels in the property casualty business while taking out so much cost. Competitors, and I think this is self-serving on their part, have talked about this and say they're capitalizing on some of your challenges. So given how important it is for the long-term sustainability of the franchise, I'm just wondering if you could talk about that topic.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

I'll start by my observations when I meet with clients, especially large groups of clients, in our client advisory councils where they give us very candid feedback, many of them have been clients of ours for 20, 30 years. In some cases, they have seen a change in the person who is their account representative. And I'd say that in the first two quarters of this year, they were pretty grumpy and they would complain about the changes. In the third quarter, a number of notable clients came to me and said that the changes we made have been a net improvement in the service quality. We have a hungrier, more focused set of leaders that are more empowered to respond to clients' needs, and they are equipped with better technology than they have before to be responsive. And so I'm very pleased with the overall – obviously, in a company that services 1 million claims a month, there will always be some that go awry and they obviously get more attention than others. But in overall terms, I'm actually very pleased on this particular point, and that's a core part of our strategy going forward, where we can focus our energy on service levels on the clients that need us most, and so that we can be for them. We can't be all things to all people in all countries, and that's a core part of our strategy.

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

And I'll just add one quick thing, Larry. It's Rob. I would just say that we are absolutely relentlessly focused on providing the best service possible to our clients. I would look at multinational as a great example of where we're doing things differently, and I think we're doing things dramatically better. So the feedback that we get from our multinational clients and the key performance indicators that we monitor regarding our speed, the accuracy, the capability that we're bringing to that space are better than they've ever been before. And I credit Carol Barton and her multinational team for some excellent leadership for us in the space.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

I think multinational is one of the most complex to service businesses there is, and I believe year-on-year, the numbers were up about 8.5%. So I think that we're pretty pleased with the way our service level is translating into growth of client business.

Kevin T. Hogan - American International Group, Inc.

Management

And I'd just add one more thing. As we are narrowing our focus, particularly in the Consumer business, we really are focused on value over volume. And we are currently participating in fewer products, fewer distribution channels and fewer geographies, which are allowing us to ensure that the places that we are focusing on, we're well-positioned to win. And so we're doing business in approximately 19 fewer territories than a few years ago and it's allowing us to focus our energy on those places that are our highest priorities.

Larry Greenberg - Janney Montgomery Scott LLC

Analyst · Janney

Thank you very much.

Elizabeth A. Werner - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Operator, I think we...

Operator

Operator

And the next...

Elizabeth A. Werner - American International Group, Inc.

Management

I'm sorry. Operator, I think we only have time for our last question since we're approaching the top of the hour.

Operator

Operator

All right. The final question is from Adam Klauber with William Blair. Adam Klauber - William Blair & Co. LLC: Thanks. A bit of a follow-on to some of the other, but directionally, you've done a lot of heavy lifting in North America P&C. So when we think about premium growth next year directionally, is it going to be more flattish, up or down?

Robert S. Schimek - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Adam, it's Rob. I guess what I would say is put in the transactions that Sid talked about earlier in his comments, so there's a couple of transactions that will impact the Commercial business. They include the Ascot transaction, the MSM transaction and the Fairfax transaction that we described. And those transactions will reduce our net written premium in the vicinity of $700 million in 2017. And then I'd say the other thing that would be an environmental factor for us with premium growth is that when we announced our plan last year in the first quarter, on January 26, we were not able to impact the very important January 1 renewals in Europe in particular, and many of the renewals that we would've had in the first quarter here in the U.S., in North America, where we really do our heavy negotiation of that well in advance of the renewal date. So I would say after we get past the first quarter, I expect our premiums, absent the three transactions that I described, to be relatively flat, maybe modest growth. But in the first quarter, especially thinking about the January 1 renewals and the fact that we'll continue to make sure we're using our risk selection tools to the best of our ability, we will have some reduction in premium in the first quarter. I think in total, it's probably accurate to say something like, including the three transactions, about a $1 billion reduction in premium in 2017 is probably about a fair benchmark for you.

Peter D. Hancock - American International Group, Inc.

Management

Adam, consistent with our commitment to value versus volume, we have been proactive in getting our expenses down and returning excess capital to shareholders so that we are less concerned about that top-line number than perhaps others, because we really want to improve the quality and sustainability of our earnings rather than just the volume. And I think that the team has done an excellent job of getting ahead of the curve on expenses so that we won't see a retreat on the expense ratio as the top line is impacted by some of these tough decisions to exit either lines of business, locations or customer segments where we don't feel we're getting adequate returns on capital. Adam Klauber - William Blair & Co. LLC: Great. That's very helpful. Thank you.

Elizabeth A. Werner - American International Group, Inc.

Management

So, I'd like to thank everyone for joining us this morning on our earnings call. I would like to answer all your questions, so if we didn't get to you this morning, please don't hesitate to reach out to us directly and we will be sure to follow up. Operator?

Operator

Operator

And this concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.