International insurance company and reinsurance company QBE announced its full-year financial results for 2025. Net profit after tax was US$2.157 billion, and the combined operating ratio increased to 91.9%.
Net profit after tax in fiscal year 2025 increased from $1.779 billion in fiscal year 2024.
Adjusted net profit after tax rose to $2.132 billion, with an adjusted return on equity of 19.8%.
QBE exceeded its mid-single-digit growth guidance, with gross written premiums (GWP) of $23.9 million in fiscal 2025, up 7% compared to fiscal 2024, or 8% if exited portfolios are excluded.
This growth was driven by targeted organic expansion across multiple categories in North America and internationally. Growth focus areas include QBE Re, A&H, Portfolio Solutions and Networks.
Excluding crops, total written premiums increased 6% and increased 8% when further excluding portfolio exits. Ex-dividend growth for the year is 6%, 5% if crops are excluded, and 7% if non-core runoff is further excluded.
Thanks to good disaster experience, the group’s consolidated operating ratio for fiscal 2025 was 91.9%, which improved from 93.1% in the previous year.
The re/insurer noted that FY25 CoR was “significantly ahead” of QBE’s guidance of about 92.5%, indicating improved balance and breadth of performance across the business.
A major contributor to this result is the significant reduction in disaster costs. The net cost of catastrophe claims fell to $751 million, or 4.1% of net insurance revenue, a significant improvement from $1.048 billion, or 5.9%, the previous year.
This result is well below the catastrophe reserves of $1.16 billion in FY25.
Conversely, ex-cat claims increased slightly, to 59.8% from 59.7% the previous year. When excluding risk adjustment and crops, the ratio rose to 54.9% from 53.0%, which the company attributed to an increase in large loss-making activities and a shift in the business mix.
Thanks to the excellent returns of the core fixed income and risk asset portfolio, total investment income reached US$1.633 billion, with a return rate of 4.9%, still a strong performance. This result is basically stable compared to the previous period’s $1.488 billion, or 4.9%.
QBE Group CEO Andrew Horton said: “QBE delivered strong results in 2025, exceeding our financial plan for the year. Profitability across most business lines remains attractive and the year ahead looks constructive for further growth and continued stable returns.”
Horton added: “2025 is a year of meaningful progress for QBE, driven by our ambition to achieve a more resilient future. Our efforts to rebalance the portfolio and stabilize performance have led to tangible improvements and the business has built strong momentum, based on disciplined execution of our strategic priorities.
“While competition has increased in some categories, QBE remains committed to our long-term strategy, underwriting discipline and maintaining strong performance.” “During this period, we continued to deliver on our sustainable growth priorities. This was supported by corporate alignment around our business priorities and strengthened by deep broker partnerships and leading regional franchises.
“Our portfolio optimization efforts have delivered meaningful change over the past several years. The exit of our North American non-core portfolio is progressing well and is largely concluded for the year, leaving our business more focused and with significantly reduced real estate catastrophe exposure.” “Our modernization priorities have been realigned to speed and efficiency to support our results-driven modernization plan. Our continued investments in digital, cloud and AI capabilities support the continued refinement of underwriting AI tools across our business.”
Looking forward, QBE aims to achieve a consolidated operating ratio of approximately 92.5% for full-year 2026, with currency GWP growth in the mid-single digits.
Over the medium term, reinsurance/insurance companies hope to achieve adjusted ROE above 15% and stable monetary GWP growth rates in the mid-single digits.