OUTsurance Group Limited (OGL)
OUTsurance Group Limited, a growing property and casualty insurance group, operating across South Africa Australia and Ireland, today reported its interim results for the six months ended 31 December 2024.
OGL holds a 92.7% interest in subsidiary OUTsurance Holdings Limited (OHL), the owner of the various insurance interests.
OGL Financial Highlights:
• Normalised earnings up 52.9% to R2,158 million
• Normalised return on equity increased to 30.8% from 21.6%
• Diluted normalised earnings per share up 53.0% to R138.6 cents
• Interim dividend up 44.8% to R88.6 cents per share
Marthinus Visser, Chief Executive Officer, OUTsurance Group Limited, said:
“Over the last three financial years, our simplified product and distribution strategy has yielded strong results, reflected in good organic growth and cost optimisation benefits. This focus on our core business is enabling stronger top line to bottom line conversion across the group. That said, profitability for the six months did benefit from a more benign natural peril claims environment than the comparative period, both in Australia and South Africa. As seen before, half-year results can vary materially because of one or two large natural peril events.
OUTsurance Ireland’s performance is in line with expectations, and we look forward to steering the business to break-even through incremental and disciplined expansion.
The near-term outlook for the geopolitical environment is uncertain and may be disruptive to the macro economy. Should the current monetary policy trends continue, we expect that lower interest rate environments in South Africa and Australia will stimulate real growth. We remain committed to leveraging our simplified strategy to drive organic growth and enhance shareholder value. This strategy has proven itself to be resilient through economic cycles.”
OHL Financial Highlights
• Normalised earnings increased by 43.5% to R2,219 million, driven by significantly less natural peril claims incurred by Youi and OUTsurance SA, coupled with strong organic premium growth and higher investment income.
• Property and Casualty gross written premium increased by 17.4% to R18,916 million, supported by satisfactory organic growth across the operating segments.
• The claims ratio decreased from 59.1% to 53.0%, as a result of the materially lower natural peril’s claims, improvement in working claims experience and higher prior year reserve releases.
• Operating profit increased by 58.8% to R2,839 million, as a result of robust profitability from all operating units.
• Total investment income increased by 37.7%, benefitting from the higher interest rate environment and organic growth.
• Earnings was impacted by an elevated share-based payments expense following a 43.3% increase in the OGL share price over the six-month period.
• Normalised ROE improved to 34.9% from 26.1% in the comparable period.
• OUTsurance Holdings remains well capitalised with a solvency multiple of 2.4 compared to a target of 1.5.
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