Arturo Raschbaum
Analyst · B.Riley
Thank you, Noah. Good morning and welcome to our third quarter earnings call. This past quarter proved to be a challenging one for the entire industry given the unprecedented level of catastrophe activity. This activity has unfortunately brought loss of life, injury and substantial financial hardship across a wide area, and we of course offer our deepest sympathies to all those have been impacted. For Maiden, as we reported in late September, our preliminary catastrophe loss estimate range was $8 million to $31 million and for the quarter, our results reflect a more refined but conservative estimate of $20 million. As of this point, we feel quite confident that this level will be sufficient to support our known and anticipated losses from these events. As one would expect, given our non-catastrophe focus, despite the magnitude of the industry loss and our relative size, the aggregate estimated value is very comfortably within our published tolerance for catastrophe events and on a relative basis, significantly smaller than severity oriented market participants. Despite the relatively modest losses from catastrophe events, Maiden's results were most significantly impacted by prior period development, primarily emanating from the AmTrust Reinsurance segment. Within this segment, we've commented previously that we've seen a significant level of claims process changes that have created distortions and loss development when compared to historical patterns. Although we believe these reflect substantial improvements throughout their claim operation and we're validating these changes through increased and enhanced audit activity, they are influencing the patterns observed in the last several quarters and as a result, we believe it's prudent to recognize much of the loss emergence observed in the quarter as prior period development. We do believe that these process changes should normalize over time given the implementation of many initiatives, which began last year. While Karen will provide a bit more detail on the prior period development shortly, the total amount of prior development recognized from the AmTrust segment was $61 million. Relative to the significant historical premiums that we've assumed from our largest client, the development realized in the quarter and on a historical basis is relatively modest. Despite the challenges of recent results, our reinsurance contracts with AmTrust remain profitable on an inception-to-date basis. Given Amtrust's recent announcement regarding their prior period development in the third quarter, I think it's appropriate to briefly discuss their actions in the context of Maiden's loss reserve actions. For Maiden, AmTrust development is and has been specific to our assumed portion of the AmTrust portfolio, rather than to the entire pre-2017 historical reserve portfolio which their adverse development cover responds to. For example, we do not reinsure any of the reserve portfolios that are associated with their post-2008 acquisitions. Additionally, we do not reinsure a number of specific components, such as their Lloyd's business, the more volatile elements of their program business, professional liability other than European hospital liability, as well as other elements of their historical portfolio. For the last several years, in fact, we've only reinsured around 25%, 27% of their overall writings as they continue to expand in segments that we don't currently participate in. And importantly, as with all of our clients, we have always performed our own reserve analysis of the AmTrust segment completely independent of AmTrust, and it is that analysis that its sole basis for our reserve booking. Because of all these factors, their adverse development cover and their use of it does not necessarily have a direct correlation to any reserve actions that we take or vice versa. That said, we do believe it is important for us to better understand how their actions in the quarter impact their view of the elements of the contract that we do reinsure, and we'll be focused on learning more about the specific components of their reported development. In the Diversified Reinsurance segment, results reflect the impact of catastrophe losses and a relatively modest level of prior period development. For our U.S.-based business, we generated a modest underwriting profit, net of our catastrophe provision, which reflects profitable current underwriting business and a modest amount of prior year development. Consistent with the last several quarters, we've observed a stabilization in the excess of loss commercial auto line, which, as you may recall has been a significant catalyst for underperformance over the last 12 to 18 months. That was in addition to a modest level of elevated loss activity from our non-AmTrust underwriting activities in Bermuda, and we also experienced elevated loss activity in the other category, reflecting higher-than-anticipated claims activity, primarily related to superstorm Sandy in our terminated excess and surplus lines of property activity. Overall, the impact of the prior period development and the cat losses do mask a number of favorable trends observed in the quarter, including a continued strengthening of our investment earnings, strong growth in our Diversified segment emanating from both our U.S. platform and our international insurance services brand and insurance solutions business, primarily in Europe, growth in unrealized gains, solid growth in invested assets and reduced share count reflecting active share repurchases in the quarter. These continuing trends will ultimately strengthen returns as we return to more stable underwriting results. For the quarter, Maiden's combined ratio was 114%, reflect both -- reflecting both the cat losses and the prior period development. That resulted in a net loss for the quarter, which Karen will provide more detail on shortly. Despite the recent prior period development after evaluating all of the necessary factors, including the company's overall capital position and liquidity as well as expected forward earnings, the preferred and common dividends remain supportable and our board confirmed the current dividend this week. Through the first three quarters, our net losses is $45 million with a net loss attributable to common shareholders of $65 million. Book value per common share is $11.30, which is down from $12.12 at year-end 2016, which reflects the impact of prior period development, but it's partially offset by unrealized gains in our investment portfolio as well as the share repurchase activity. Clearly, today our share price reflects shareholder reaction to our reported prior period development, but it's our view that at the current share price, the level of discount is unrealistic, and it presupposes a dramatically higher future level of prior period development. We obviously don't agree, but as I stated in the past, we believe that as management, we have an absolute obligation to respond and validate prior period development. We remain committed to strengthen and stabilize our underwriting performance. As I mentioned earlier, for the quarter, business development activity was particularly strong in our Diversified segment. Overall, however, gross premiums written across Maiden were down year-over-year, reflecting a significant reduction in AmTrust seeded premiums in the quarter in comparison to the third quarter of 2016. In the aggregate, gross premiums written for the quarter were down 11%. Beginning with the Diversified segment, overall gross written premiums for the quarter were up 13% from the prior year. You may recall that earlier this year, we recorded slower growth rates, which reflected the impact of several terminated U.S. accounts, one involving a large commutation. Third quarter reflects the successful expansion of existing client relationships along with new account development in our U.S. business, which have fully offset the earlier in the year reduction. Personal auto remains a strong area of focus in growth. As we prepare for the upcoming January 1, 2018, renewal season, there are a significant number of account opportunities that we're currently evaluating. While we believe that it's too early to see any impact of market changes that would have a direct impact on our non-cat-focused business model, we do believe that we will see increased demand for capital support across certain geographies and lines of business. While the market to-date remains competitive, we continue to find opportunities to profitably grow our portfolio and maintain pricing discipline. Our commercial auto portfolio remains relatively modest and business written in this line reflects stronger pricing and significantly enhance risk selection. In our international insurance services office -- excuse me, business, we also experienced strong year-over-year growth in the quarter, chiefly from the expansion of existing client relationships as well as new original equipment manufacturer and non-OEM affinity insurance relationships. This has been a solid year of what we believe to be profitable growth, and we have a strong pipeline of new opportunities under development. And then finally, in our developing European capital solutions business, we added a new account relationship in the quarter and while overall revenue from this activity remains relatively modest, we continue to see a growing level of interest from our targeted regional insurance market. Within the AmTrust segment, gross premium written was down 19%. We anticipated a drop emanating from the program segment with the prior quarter's news that several significant programs had been terminated as of September 1, along with a slower rate of organic growth, both of which are occurring. In addition, the decline in premium written reflects changes in 2017 to the mix of programs in the specialty risk and extended warranty business and in 2016, the cession of premium for the first time from a series of acquisitions made by AmTrust in its small commercial and specialty program businesses. As we indicated last quarter, we anticipate a continued deceleration of growth rates as AmTrust focuses on disciplined underwriting and a reduction in M&A activity. Overall growth should continue to moderate for the segments of the AmTrust portfolio reinsured by Maiden, and overall, we believe that the opportunities for Maiden remain significant and that our various strategic platforms continue to serve us well as we carefully build our diversified portfolio and support the ongoing needs of our largest client AmTrust. I'd now like to turn the call over to our Chief Financial Officer, Karen Schmitt, who'll provide more detail on the quarter. Karen?