10 Largest Property and Casualty Insurance Companies in 2018

What are the 10 Largest Property and Casualty Insurance Companies in 2018? Let’s find out.

Property and casualty insurance helps protect people from the unexpected. Given that the unexpected happens all the time and sometimes when you least expect it, property and casualty insurance is often essential.

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Although there are many subcategories of property and casualty insurance, most people are familiar with two, homeowners insurance and car insurance. Homeowners insurance helps  insure a home against theft or fire. It can also provide liability coverage in the event that someone gets hurt in your home. Car insurance insures a vehicle and can provide liability coverage in the case of an accident. Many states require drivers to have car insurance when driving.

Like many things in life, the exact coverage and conditions needed for an insurance contract to pay out varies from policy to policy. In aggregate, property and casualty insurers make money by setting the price of coverage above the amount of payouts. If done correctly, property and casualty insurance can be a very profitable business, especially if an insurance company has considerable scale. Due to the recurrent nature of insurance contracts, many insurer’s revenues are rather stable versus that of other companies.

Over the past few years, property and casualty insurance companies have benefited from several trends. One trend that has helped is higher interest rates. Higher interest rates allow many property and casualty insurers to make more money from the capital they have. Given that the U.S. economy is strong and near full employment, many investors believe the Federal Reserve will continue to raise interest rates in the coming years. Higher rates could lead to greater profits for many insurers.

Another tailwind for insurers is the emergence of big data. With machine learning and more comprehensive datasets, many insurers have arguably priced policies better for their risk, and the smarting pricing has resulted in greater profits for many insurers.

With that said, the property and casualty isn’t immune to disruption. With the rise of autonomous driving, the total number of vehicle accidents will eventually fall, potentially leading to lower demand for car insurance. Homeowners insurance could also one day be disrupted by new online technologies.

Now that the preliminaries are out of the way, let’s analyze the 10 largest property and casualty insurance companies in 2018. As a note to our methodology, we use data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, and assume that 2018’s numbers aren’t that different from 2017. All market share and premiums written, etc. data is only concerning property and casualty. The market share stats are based on filings received as of 3/26/2018 and incorporate around 97.7% of estimated property and casualty filings. 

In terms of specific companies, the 10 largest property and casualty insurers include some publicly traded companies in the United States such as Chubb Ltd (NYSE:CB), Travelers Companies Inc (NYSE:TRV), Progressive Corp (NYSE:PGR), Allstate Corp (NYSE:ALL), and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B (NYSE: BRK.B).

#10 Nationwide

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In terms of P&C, Nationwide did around $19.21 billion in direct premium written for 2017, good for 3.01% market share. Nationwide is also famous for having Peyton Manning in its commercials.

#9 Farmers Insurance

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Farmers Insurance is number 9 on our list, with $19.8 billion in direct premiums written and 3.11% market share for property and casualty. Farmers Insurance is owned by Zurich Financial Services.

#8 USAA

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USAA comes in eighth on our list of  the 10 Largest Property and Casualty Insurance Companies in 2018. USAA did $20.151 billion in direct premiums written and reported $19.494 billion in direct premiums earned.

#7 Chubb Ltd (NYSE:CB)

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Chubb Ltd (NYSE:CB) reported direct premiums written of over $21.2 billion for 2017 for P&C, good for 3.32% market share. Chubb Ltd (NYSE:CB) shares are down 7% year-to-date.

#6 Travelers Companies Inc (NYSE:TRV)

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Travelers Companies Inc (NYSE:TRV) has a 3.9% market share with direct premiums written of $24.875 billion. Travelers Companies Inc (NYSE:TRV)’s direct loss to EP ratio was 56.64 which was the lowest ratio for the P&C insurers on our list.

#5 Progressive Corp (NYSE:PGR)

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Progressive Corp (NYSE:PGR) brought in direct premiums written of $27.86 billion in terms of property and casualty for 2017. That gives Progressive Corp (NYSE:PGR) 4.36% market share for P&C.

#4 Allstate Corp (NYSE:ALL)

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Allstate Corp (NYSE:ALL) comes in at number four on our list with $31.5 billion in direct premiums written. Allstate Corp (NYSE:ALL) shares are down around 6% year-to-date.

#3 Liberty Mutual

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Liberty Mutual had $33.8 billion in direct premiums written and around 5.3% market share. In addition to P&C, Liberty Mutual also provides life insurance.

#2 Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B (NYSE: BRK.B)

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Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B (NYSE: BRK.B) is second in terms of property and casualty market share with 6.02%. Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B (NYSE: BRK.B) shares are down 2% year-to-date. 

#1 State Farm

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With $64.89 billion in direct premiums written, State Farm is by far the largest P&C insurer on our list of the 10 Largest Property and Casualty Insurance Companies in 2018. State Farm has around 10.16% market share.

Disclosure:none