Okay, we are good to go. It's 10:35 A.M., so that means it's time for Palomar, so I want to welcome CEO Mac Armstrong and CFO Chris Uchida to this panel, and I always say that one of the things that impressed me the most about Palomar when we first heard this story is that insurance is in North America; it's a very mature industry, so the ability to actually identify a hole and say, "Hey, this need isn't being addressed," is actually a fairly rare skill, so when Palomar entered the market saying, "We need an insurance product for earthquakes," that was actually an impressive observation that has been realized, I think, phenomenally well, and since then, obviously expanded beyond that. We've spent a lot of time talking about that, but first I wanna hand it over to Mac, just for introductory comments.
Great. Thanks, Meyer. It's terrific to be here. We always look forward to this conference. We do think it's from an insurance standpoint, there's none finer. So we're thrilled to be here because we're excited about what 2024 has afforded us to date and what we see in front of us in 2025 . You know, we outlined the beginning of the year four strategic imperatives: grow where we want to, managing our diversification and the dislocation in the market, continue to generate consistent earnings, and fourthly, scale our organization. We think that we've done a good job on in all four phases, and as such, we feel that we're well positioned for 2024, but more so and importantly, in 2025.
So we're excited to talk to you today about what we've accomplished and what we intend to accomplish.
Great, thanks. There was, for those of us that have been following Palomar, there was a ton of news on the Q2 call. I want to say just about all of it positive. It was a little tricky to figure out where we wanted to start the discussion, so this is almost random. But let's start with Surety.
Yeah.
Like, what made you decide that Surety was an attractive line? And when you look at your backgrounds, and I'm thinking maybe unfairly at Arrowhead, where there was an integration mindset, because of Brown & Brown's acquisition philosophy. What are the steps that are necessary to integrate the Surety company within Palomar?
Yeah. So you're absolutely right. Surety was one of the headlines in the Q2. We bought a company, First Indemnity of America, a regionally focused surety based in New Jersey. And it was the culmination, in many ways, of a multi-year effort of assessing the surety market. It was a market that we found very attractive from a unit-level economics standpoint, attractive from a barriers to entry standpoint, whether it was claims expertise, underwriting expertise, or licensing. And we took the decision, ultimately, to buy versus build. It was the first buy that we've done for a new line of business.
And we are excited because what we are bringing on is a team of experts in a class of business that will be complementary from an economic standpoint to what we do. Importantly, though, it's a modest-size acquisition, so it's digestible and one in which we think we can export a lot of our best practices to the broader market. They write heavily in the Northeast in classes like subdivisions in contractors. That complements what we do in our builders risk business. It complements what we do in our contractors GL and contractors' excess liability business.
So our hope, intention, and plan is to extend that franchise on a regional basis, and build it into, you know, a meaningful contributor to our overall casualty and also just overall specialty insurance franchise. Because it's small, like, we don't have to go to great lengths to integrate it.
It's really gonna be focusing on how we can bring more to bear from a distribution standpoint, and complement it with our existing product suite. So we'll dust off the playbook from some of our Arrowhead days, but this is not one that's going to be a heavy organizational lift, so to speak.
Right.
It's really one that we can be more strategic and drive top line and bottom line growth.
Fantastic. Can you talk a little bit about the decision? I mean, it's not a massive company from a premium standpoint.
Yeah.
So the advantages to buying over build, like, can you walk us through that thought process?
It really is the competence of this management team there.
Mm-hmm.
Pat Lynch has built a 40-year knowledge base in the surety market, where he can not only assess a risk effectively, but really understand the collateral that's needed, the counterparty exposure, and as a result, the claims management process. And in doing so, they've generated, you know, best-in-class loss ratios. And but I think it's also one that if we can take some of that institutional knowledge and bring it to bear into our franchise in the Western U.S., for instance, we can really drive, you know, strong returns in a modest line of business now, but build it into something that's more meaningful. So I think it really stems to the underwriting and claims management expertise that they possessed, was something that's gonna be very hard for us to replicate.
Okay. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Can you talk about the geographic implications? In other words, their focus is the Northeast.
Yeah.
How different is the surety world when we look at the western half of the United States?
Yeah, I mean, it's a regional line, no question. But I think the how you underwrite and manage claims is replicable and exportable. What will need to be invested in will be the service and the people in the field, because it is a, it's a hyper local line of insurance. So for us to go into, you know, Arizona, California, and Nevada, we're gonna need regional underwriters and claims people that can support. But the institutional knowledge is very exportable. So you'll see us invest in talent in this line, much like we've done in casualty, builders risk, pick your line, earthquake, for that matter. So you'll see us make investments there, but the good thing is that the margin profile is one that affords the ability to invest.
Right. Fantastic. I always ask these questions as though it's as easy as flipping a switch, and I wanna acknowledge that it's not. But can we talk about the timeline for saying, "Okay, they've got a distribution force-
Yeah.
- that doesn't have all of your products. You've got a distribution force that doesn't have theirs. How do we cross-pollinate, and how, how long does that take?
Yeah. So I mean, I think the acquisition is likely to close in the Q4.
Mm-hmm.
We're in the midst of the formal approval process with the state of New Jersey, and so 2025 will be one where it's kind of taking the institutional knowledge that they possess and populating across Palomar, and allowing us to selectively target distribution partners that are maybe preferred partners in builders risk, for instance. So, you know, when we announced the acquisition, we heard from some of our partners at Hub in Texas, that they have a need, and so that would be a logical one because we do a ton of builders risk with them.
Mm-hmm.
So it'd be, "Okay, how can we complement what we're doing in builders risk with Surety, and make sure that it's in line with the underwriting requirements, and processes, and procedures that we have in the Northeast with FIA?
Okay. That sort of edges on to another question, or maybe as a follow-up. Surety has somewhat of a unique distribution channel.
Yeah.
But if we're talking about, you know, top ten brokers, then it should be easier to access that.
That's exactly-
- based on relationships.
Yeah, that's exactly right. I mean, these are all firms that we are trading with, with other lines of business, but I think it's not one where you're gonna open up every office, and that's been our approach with any line. Like, when we go into a new line of business, it's we're taking a serial approach to opening up distribution channels. You know, our commercial business is heavily wholesale produced, but it's also selected offices within that wholesale footprint.
Right.
What we wanna do here is make sure that we're going with producers that we have a long-standing history with, ones that understand the class of business, and our underwriters are gonna be comfortable transacting with. That's no different than what we're doing in contractors liability, real estate E&O, or builders risk, for that matter. We're gonna take that playbook and import that. It means that 2025 is going to be, you know, let's get this acquisition integrated and up and running, but really well positioned to really scale 2026, 2027, and beyond.
Understood. And then looking at the flip side of it, and I should introduce this by saying that the only earthquake I've ever been subject to, I was on the beach in New Jersey.
Right.
We don't think of New Jersey as-
Yeah
... like, a huge earthquake arena. Which of your lines are most amenable to being exported to the Northeast or the East Coast?
I think builders risk in inland marine, so our excess national property and builders risk, and then I think certain of our casualty business can be as well. You know, as we've entered into the casualty market, we've wanted to do it in a deliberate fashion from both a line size standpoint, from a distribution standpoint, so we could, A, service the business, but also know that what we are writing fit well within our box. So I think, you know, as we move into the Northeast, that or where there might be some complements with what FIA has, it's gonna be builders risk and probably contractor's general liability.
Okay, perfect. I want to spend a little bit of time on the fronting line of business that you've got. I've always liked fronting because underwriting risk scares us. Obviously-
Yeah
... you found a very capable way of handling it. But one of the pieces of news on the fronting side that was that one of your clients had gotten its own licensure-
Yeah
... and therefore, was less relevant. How vulnerable is the remaining, fronting premium that you have to that sort of graduation, where having a front is no longer necessary?
Yeah, I would say that was the strong exception. You know, at the Omaha National, we were fronting for them for California Workers' Compensation. You know, they were an A minus, A.M. Best A minus rated company that just didn't have a Certificate of Authority in California. So we knew that that was going to eventually run its course, and they would achieve the requisite licensing. You feel great about them as a counterparty, and so we've always said we are gonna be selective with our partners. I think this is a case where the selectivity proved its merits because they ultimately did get the COA and are now on their way. But again, they are the strong exception.
The majority of who we front for are going to be reinsurers that don't have primary licensure, smaller insurance companies that don't have the requisite financial size.
Mm-hmm
... or A.M. Best rating, or MGAs that don't intend on becoming primary insurers.
Right.
It is the exception. I think the other thing I would add on fronting, though, is we like fronting as a line of business for us.
Mm-hmm.
We also like fronting for the fee stream that it brings, but it's not one that we have to chase every deal, because we have the strong majority of our economics earned from underwriting and the four other lines of business that we operate in, or product categories that we operate in. So, this was one we were sad to see go because it was a nice contributor, but it's one that we can certainly play through and will play through.
Right, but the way you've described it just now is that, you know, you had this expectation, in which case-
Yeah
... it made sense even to do it, if it was gonna be a temporary relationship.
Yeah. I mean, it was three years of decent business for us, and we still have a pipeline of fronting deals, and we brought on one in the marine and yachting space in the Q2. And there will be more to come, but we're not gonna overextend ourselves, 'cause I know we like, for the same reason you are, that you do that, it is fee generative, but fronting also is where you can get surprised. And so-
Mm-hmm
... having a handful of relationships that we can manage as if we are on risk, no different than any of our other lines, gives us very strong confidence in avoiding those surprises.
Right. I mean, I'm dating myself a little bit when I say I remember Mutual Risk, so-
Yeah. Yeah
... it is what it is. This is a terrible question, so slap me if it's appropriate.
Yeah.
But can you still compete for the business, that Omaha is now entitled to write on its own?
Yeah, we have a filing that's in place and approved by the state, but the expectation is we won't. We don't have workers' comp in-house domain expertise at this point, so it's not one that we're prioritizing.
Okay.
Yeah.
Fair enough.
Good question.
Can you give us some insight into what the state of competition is in the fronting market? There are a number of companies out there that we know, but I don't know what... I don't understand necessarily the intensity of competitiveness between fronts.
Yeah, I mean, I think there certainly is competition. For us, when we're going after a deal that we feel it's one that we're well positioned in, whether it's because we can leverage our reinsurance relationships or expertise, or they like the fact that we're A-rated paper with financial size category X, approaching XI. So when we're going after a deal, we're not in a overly competitive dynamic. We feel like we've got a pretty good chance to win it. And again, though, this is, it's a pipeline that's ample, but they're all well qualified and ones that we feel that we have a chance to win, and so we're gonna allocate our time appropriately to 'em and not chase, you know, a private passenger auto deal.
Oh, okay. Oh, I was gonna ask, what is it that determines which lines you find to be attractive and which ones not?
I think it's underlying the counterparty exposure, first and foremost, and then line of business in terms of the long-term sustainability of the reinsurance or the capital that's supporting it. So we've stayed away from property with the exception of really one, and we've certainly stayed away from lines that tend to be more transient.
Mm-hmm
... like private passenger auto and commercial-
Right
... auto, for that matter.
Yeah. No, that makes perfect sense. I'm gonna pause just to see if there are any questions in the room, and then, soldier on. If you have a question, please don't hesitate to raise your hand. I wanna make sure that everyone's getting the information that you specifically want. Moving to property, which is not a small line of business-
Yeah
... in this broadest sense. There's been a lot of chatter recently about decelerating rate increases. So really two questions stemming from that. One, how does that impact growth expectations? And second, and I wanna highlight that this is a separate question, how does that impact profitability and expected returns in the various property lines that you're focused on?
Yeah, so I think it does vary by line of business, and so with, you know, in whether it's commercial or residential business, so even like commercial earthquake and residential earthquake, the pricing dynamic is different. Commercial earthquake, you're still seeing rate increases. It's not to the degree that you saw in a year ago.
Mm-hmm.
Residential Earthquake, we still have, depending on the state, an 8%-10% inflation guard that is automatically renewed, and we see no dissipation in our retention rates there. So I'd say in that line of business, there's rate stability, if not, you know, still attractive continuing rate increases. So, that's a little bit different than our Commercial All Risk-
Mm-hmm
... where you've seen the rate increases go from 40% up to flattish. But I think in both earthquake and all risk, the underlying profitability, the average annual loss to premium or the PML out of premium, is the best we've seen in our company's history. That's it. It's still very compelling. I think the other thing that I would add is, there's rate integrity in the market still. I think a lot of that's driven by lines that may have severe convective storm exposure-
Mm-hmm
... that's mostly retained and not transferred to reinsurers. That means people need to recoup losses. So you look at a state like, you know, we took some loss in the Q2 on builders risk in Texas.
Right.
There's going to be rate increase in the state of Texas on builders risk, much like there is in the homeowners, because there's been loss. Even where you've seen some rate deceleration, there are pockets of the market where you are still gonna see increase, and or that, that's merited and needed. I think another example of that is Hawaii. We write Hawaii Hurricane exposure, purely for, purely on risk when there is a hurricane watch or warning in any of the given counties in Hawaii. We got a 20% rate increase in that line, for that line in the Q2 because of dislocation and the need to cover rising cost of reinsurance.
So it's regionally specific, it's line of business specific, and on the whole, the underlying unit level economics and the profitability is as good as it's ever been.
... One thing I'd add to that also is that when you think about the bottom line, obviously that's where we're always focused. We still have great ability to grow the top line, but we still have probably more ability to grow the bottom line because of the way we use reinsurance. You see that in two places. Excess of loss, we've seen better rates in the excess of loss market. That increases the net earned premium, obviously, the bottom line. And also, a lot of these lines where we do have attritional exposure, we use quota share reinsurance.
Yeah.
And so we are still ceding off the majority of that business to reinsurers. So as our balance sheet grows, we have the ability to take more and more of that business on our balance sheet, which will increase net earned premium and the bottom line at potentially a greater rate than the top line. So we have the ability to grow net income or earnings per share at a greater rate than the top line.
Okay. No, that's phenomenally helpful.
Yeah.
Yeah, and it's too early to ask this question, but I'm going to ask it anyway because we're off to Monte Carlo soon.
Yeah.
Do you have any expectations for the part of your book where the reinsurance renews in January, any internal or external expectations?
I would say my view on the reinsurance market. We sit here today, and we're still in the midst of the wind season.
For the most part.
But I think for Palomar specifically, even when you think about what could still be an active wind season, on excess of loss, you know, we only have $100 million of continental hurricane exposure. The next $3 billion plus $3 billion is earthquake or Hawaiian hurricane or earthquake only. So, the reinsurance that could be impacted negatively from a pricing standpoint is de minimis. So we feel very good about stability in pricing, if not some favorability, because reinsurers' balance sheets continue to grow. We saw a rate decrease 5%-7% at 6/1. And, there's also extraneous factors that's relevant to us or maybe just unique to us, in that the largest buyer of earthquake insurance in the California Earthquake Authority is continuing to buy less.
So there's going to be a supply, demand imbalance that will benefit us. So we feel good about reinsurance pricing right now. Things could change. We know that we have the ability to play through rising rate increases, and we certainly know that we have the ability to scale quite nicely in a decelerating rate environment.
Yeah.
And if I sit here today, I'd probably think that's more likely than a hardening market.
Right. Obviously, subject to Mother Nature and-
Well, yeah
... whatever surprises she has. That's helpful.
Yeah.
Chris, you mentioned an important point, and I just want to sort of emphasize it or amplify it, and that is it's been a long-standing strategy of Palomar to gradually and modestly increase your retentions on these-
Mm-hmm
... on the excess of loss coverages that you have. And you've alluded to the fact that the economics are actually better to the extent that you retain it, not recklessly. But it's something you can walk us through that in a little bit more detail. If you retain another, I don't know if it's X million per occurrence or percentages on the quota share, how that impacts the bottom line.
Yeah, I mean, I think it's just positively right. The simplistic model is, let's say that these businesses are running at 80% combined.
Right.
Right? So when we're ceding it off, we're probably making five to seven points of margin on that line of business. Obviously, if we were to retain it, let's call it 20 points of margin. So you can increase that 4x, so to speak, on the bottom line. So obviously, line of business specific, but when you look at each line of business, whether it be in the inland marine, casualty, that do have a heavy amount of quota share reinsurance, over time, as we take more of that, let's say you could argue that we can increase the bottom line from that line of business specifically to, you know, three to four times what it is right now. So we do need to make sure we have the balance sheet to support that.
Mm-hmm.
We also want to make sure that these lines, I'll call it, can support themselves, right? We want to look at the payback of each of these lines. We don't want to have an outsized loss from a line that just started yesterday, upfront.
Right.
So we want to make sure we take our time and do that, you know, strategically to make sure that we don't have an outsized loss at the beginning. But we do think that these are profitable lines of business. We do think, you know, we are sharing some of these profits with the reinsurers. We have a lot of reinsurance support. We have a lot of a strong reinsurance team on our staff. But overall, we do think these are profitable lines that we will be able to capture more of that net income over time as we look at it. But that's simplistically the best way to look at it, is it's-
Right
... called five points of margin, turning into something that's going to be 15-20 times type of margin.
Right.
But I think it's important, though, to emphasize that we're taking the tack of walking before we run-
Right
in all these lines. Our flood line, we started off taking 10% and ceding off 90%, now it's a 50-50 quota share. Our real estate E&O, which is our most mature casualty line, we started off ceding 60%, now we cede closer to 50%. That's over four years. As books season-
Right
... and the underwriting proves itself out, we have that optionality. We're always going to have some type of reinsurance that supports those attritional baselines. You know, it may end up changing from a quota share to excess of loss or maintain a quota share, but the balance that it affords us in generating consistent earnings, we also don't want to sacrifice, so we want to have that consistent earnings base and not be overly impacted by a shock loss, and that also can be dictated by us writing modest gross lines too, in some of these too.
Right.
So as Chris also points out, like, we have the ability to increase our line size as the balance sheet grows. That might be more relevant for builders risk or an earthquake than it is for real estate E&O, but we don't want to overextend. We want to have consistent earnings. So that optionality is something for us to do very deliberately.
... Right, and that makes perfect sense, because I think the predictability of earnings is certainly something that Palomar shareholders value.
Yeah.
You talked about increasing line size, and I'm wondering, the state of competition, one of the benefits to the insurance industry, besides pricing over the last few years, is line sizes have declined.
Yeah.
From a competitive standpoint, are we seeing any change in that behavior? Are competitors extending line sizes?
No, we haven't. We, you know, a handful of property markets are putting out modestly larger lines, but no, and I think we take solace in the fact, like, when we reunderwrote our commercial wind, but one of the key things we did was meaningfully contract our line size, and we're not. We have no intention of changing that. Like, we like the fact that our average, all risk line is about $750,000.
Right.
So if there is a major hurricane, you don't see a single pop throwing off your results for the quarter. You know, you're much more insulated from, you know, a single shock loss, and that's applied to our property business or casualty business alike. And again, I would say in this market right now, while you might not see the rate increases, you still see rate integrity. You still see underwriting integrity, and I think some of that's in managing the line sizes. And I think the other thing there is, if you look at cat losses year to date, and for the good portion of last year, they're predominantly borne by the primary insurer.
Yeah.
And so if you... You're not gonna increase your line size, but you're gonna retain more of that.
Right. Yeah, and, and it's been sort of an interesting phenomenon because it wasn't just this theoretical adjustment where reinsurance costs and attachment points went up in 2023 , but it didn't matter. It mattered almost right away.
Yeah. Yeah.
So you had those losses emerge.
Yeah, and I think that's the other thing that I should have said when we were talking about the reinsurance prognostications. I still think that attachment points in terms of conditions, reinsurers are going to be very mindful of and will hold the line there.
Pricing?
They have a little bit of slack in the system built in.
Right. Okay, let's get back to earthquake and talk about the remaining growth opportunity as you see it, both on the personal and on the commercial side.
Yeah. On the personal side, you know, we're in a good spot in the market, in the sense that we have a California homeowners market that remains dislocated, which means there are new entrants coming into the market that needs a partner on the earthquake side. As a reminder, if you are going to offer a homeowners policy, in the state of California, you have to offer earthquake. It can be through a partner. So we partner with over 20 different insurers, in the state to provide a complementary earthquake policy or companion earthquake policy alongside the homeowners. And so we just have a new partnership with Cincinnati Financial that came online in the Q2 that's doing well. We have a pipeline of others.
So that's one dynamic that's continuing to unfold and drive benefits for us, especially as the homeowners market in California remains a bit dislocated. Secondly, you know, we do have rate increases that are flowing through 8%-10% on an annual basis. As I said earlier, we're not seeing any degradation in our retention. So that's a stable dynamic that we like on the residential quake side. Thirdly, and most importantly, is the California Earthquake Authority, our largest competitor, the largest writer in the state. It continues to meaningfully reduce its claims-paying capacity and its coverages. And so what you have is a circumstance where they are re-offering renewals at much reduced coverage, whether it's the coverage A or potentially a higher deductible, or your contents coverage.
So a lot of these policies are being shopped and coming back out in the market, and frankly, the CEA's endorsing us as an alternative to them in many instances.
Mm-hmm.
So that's a healthy dynamic for us. One thing that we have not seen, but we're optimistic that could be a nice driver for us going into next year and beyond, is if interest rates come down, like housing, new housing sales, and just overall housing sales activities, could potentially be a benefit for us on the residential side. The commercial side, there is still ample room for growth. The pricing is not what it was in 2023, but it's still stable. The underlying metrics are as strong as ever, and, you know, as our balance sheet's grown, we have been able to offer a little bit larger line. And we've bought incremental reinsurance capacity to support our growth there from an XOL standpoint.
We think that quake can continue to be, you know, we said this year, 18%-20%, we think that's sustainable.
Okay. And I'm looking around the room again in case there are any questions here, but I guess the counterpart would be there are non-U.S. earthquake zones as well. How interesting is that to Palomar?
I think the Pacific, or Pacific Northwest, Seattle has the same exposure as Vancouver and British Columbia. So I do think Canada's potentially a market that we could look at. Canada's always been cheaper historically.
Mm-hmm.
So, I'd rather write something in Seattle, and I'm getting four and a half times my average annual loss, versus something in Vancouver that's getting three times the average annual loss.
Right.
So, but there is opportunity in Canada. I think, you know, we're not looking to go right in Chile or Japan at this point. You know, there's enough opportunity in the U.S. and potentially Canada to satisfy our near-term growth objectives.
Okay. Yeah, no, Japan and Chile, and I guess New Zealand would be the-
Yeah, yeah
... areas we're asking about. So I was gonna say on the Q2, but this has been a recurring phenomenon where there's new news to be announced. In other words, there's a new product line that you're expanding into.
Yeah.
And I was hoping you could talk us through two things. I'm sure you're not gonna say, "Okay, these are the next seven products coming out-
Yeah, yeah.
which is fine, but can you take us through the process of product development? You mentioned that you buy a lot of reinsurance. How will you ensure that the results aren't gonna be a threat to the reinsurance relationships that you have on these new products?
Yeah, so, you know, we are constantly assessing markets. We think that's one of our strengths, and it's looking at a market to determine if there we can generate a risk-adjusted return that's consistent with our goal of maintaining an ROE above 20%. And then determining what we have that we can leverage. That might be reinsurance relationships, it certainly could be distribution relationships, and most importantly, talent and technology to address that market. You know, right now, we have launched a lot of new products, as you've touched upon, and so what our focus is really bringing on incremental talent to help us expand geographically in a line like national property, or real estate agency, you know, or contractors GL. So, it's leveraging talent and technology that will allow us to scale into these markets.
As it relates to the reinsurance, you know, I think, you know, we have, you know, our property excess of loss program has over 100 reinsurers on it.
Mm-hmm.
So, we have the ability to trade with a lot of them, and there's a faith and confidence that they have because we've made them a decent amount of money over the last, now eleven years, on the excess of loss side, that they know that we're conservative in how we underwrite, even if it's a casualty risk versus a property risk. And there's some institutional knowledge that might give a new reinsurer, a confidence rather, of an existing reinsurer confidence in a new line of business.
Got it.
We can trade the earthquake premium for a little bit of a leap of faith if it's a new line of business, like, professional liability.
Fantastic. When you say over a hundred reinsurers, I'm curious, should that ideally be 120 ? Should it be 80? Should it be where it is now?
We'd love to add more. It's never a bad thing, especially as we-
Mm
... buy more excess of loss limit. No single reinsurer on the excess of loss tower is more than 3% at this point, so I mean, 4%, excuse me. But so we're not concentrated. So I'm a firm believer, and I don't want to be over-reliant on a singular one of them.
Right.
So yeah, if we could have a 120 , that'd be great.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
But so we should think about that. You're not looking to constrict that panel-
No, no
... from your perspective. I want to spend a little bit of time on crop, like the ambition, I think, is $500 million in-
Yeah
- written premium. What are the assumptions underpinning that, and what are the steps you're taking to get there?
Yeah. So, I mean, the good thing is, you know, when you hear an insurance company talk about going from $15 million in one year to $500 million in the next few, people tend to get worried, and rightfully so. But when you have the crop insurance market, where rates and commissions are set by the federal government, it's not one where you're burning your way into it. You have to execute your way into it.
Right.
And so for us, it's gonna be premised around, you know, technology and service, and that's where we're making investments on the technology side and the servicing side. We've made a strategic investment in a distribution partner, in Advanced AgProtection, that has great underlying technology to manage the claims process. And then for us, it's investing in the technology in terms of risk participation and optimization. We brought on a gentleman named James Long from RenRe to help us execute the crop plan from a technology standpoint and from a risk participation and optimization standpoint. So ultimately, it's gonna be investing in systems and service, and then investing in technology and data to optimize our risk participation, which frankly, that's kind of been our differentiator since we started.
You know, that risk transfer and portfolio management, even though it's a different line of business, there's a lot that borrows from it, and our team's been doing, both on the quake and the crop side, for almost the entirety of their careers.
Okay, fantastic. Oh, sorry, go ahead. We've got a question. I'm just gonna bring the mic over to you. Well, I won't, but someone will.
Sprint down there.
So on crop, just there's essentially, you know, players that have succeeded. It's a tough business.
Yeah.
Some have succeeded, some have done very poorly over many, many years, and I know reinsurance is a big part of that. And so what is your idea of the formula to kind of win in that market, not in terms of growing it, but profitably?
Yeah. So, it's a good question, and I think it's no different than any other line of business, though. It's just a keen understanding of your exposure. And so for us, it's looking at producer-level profitability, historically and current, having a well-defined appetite from a regional and product perspective, what you're gonna write, and that's what we're doing. So that's what we're investing in, is being able to look at producer-level profitability, being able to get and service the claims promptly so things don't get exacerbated from a yield perspective, and the acreage reports, being slow to respond to the acreage reports and book the premium or understanding the exposure there. So it's no different than what we do on earthquake.
It's obviously, it's a different product and it's a different competence, but it's the same astute focus on exposure management and understanding, and being able to access the data at a more granular level than maybe some of your competitors. And I think it's, you know, the other thing I'd point out, like for us, we, we want to build this into a $500 million. That's 2.5% market share. You know, so for there are people here that divested a $1 billion crop book as an afterthought. Like for us, if we could build a $1 billion crop book, like, it will be a, a, a big lift for us, but it'll also be, you know, very, very closely managed because it's a different level of importance.
... You've talked a number of times about attracting talent.
Yeah.
What does the market for talent look like right now?
You know, we've been very lucky. We've brought on some exceptional people. We just hired our new COO, Rudy Herve, joined us from SCOR, where he was president of SCOR North America. And then global CTO, I referenced James Long, joined us from RenRe. We have someone starting on Friday that's a 25-year casualty veteran that will help us extend our E&S casualty franchise. We've been able to attract some terrific people. And there's competition for talent, there's no question about that, but I think what we afford them is the ability for them to execute a business plan, but have infrastructure behind them, and a competence in potentially reinsurance and technology that they may not have had at their prior stops.
Okay, thanks. And then on the technology side, so I was gonna ask this specifically to crop. Crop is unique. You can't compete on price, you can't compete on commission.
Yeah.
So it's technology. What is it specifically that you're investing in to make your product more appealing to the distribution force out there?
Frankly, again, it's this concept of exposure managed, but letting your producers see the exposure. So letting them see how they are trending from a growth perspective, how they are able to get the status of the claims. So for them, it's just exposure management and visibility into the claims process. And so that's what we're investing in, and being able to do it at a producer or ultimately a single farm level.
Got it.
Yeah.
You mentioned casualty. I'm gonna follow up on that.
Yeah.
I'm gonna ask this in two different ways. Like, how big do you want the casualty book to be? And how far from property adjacent casualty lines should we expect Palomar to go?
You know, we have six or seven niches right now that we're riding in, from real estate E&O, to environmental liability, to miscellaneous professional liability, et cetera, that we still have a lot of room for growth in. And so it's not one. We're more focused on going deeper in those, than we are in expanding. So we want to see the casualty business. I think casualty ended up last quarter, roughly 14% of the book, Chris? 12-14%. We'd like to see it continue to grow rapidly, so it's probably gonna over-index the growth of certainly the whole company in a line like earthquake, which is our largest. But I think it's important to say, like, earthquake will always be our anchor.
Right.
We want it to be so. So casualty, if it can get to 20%, that'd be great, but it's not gonna come at the expense of overextending our footprint in casualty or taking capital away from earthquake.
Right, and no med-mal, that's what I'm-
Yeah.
Okay, fair enough.
Yeah.
And we've got time for one final question. And with nothing in the audience, I'll just ask: What about cyber? And again, we've covered a ton of lines of business, so.
Yeah. Well, so cyber is one we've been a front for, going on four years. And I will say, like, we take a small risk participation. It was 5%, I think it's now 7.5%. The book has performed well. It's a concentrated strategy focusing on less than $100 million revenue accounts with great technology that allows you to assess the exposure and patch in real time if there is a perceived potential for a breach. So it's an end market, it's obviously a large market that's growing. So it's one that we like, that we are in a kind of a catbird seat, where we can do kind of free R&D on that market.
Mm-hmm.
And have the option, like Chris has talked about in other lines, to potentially increase the risk participation. But right now, we like being a front more than a, you know, direct primary insurer.
Perfect. And with that, we are literally out of time-
All right.
to the second.
Great.
So please join me in thanking Mac and Chris for a phenomenal session.
Thank you.