Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Jeff Meuler : I want to ask about the pickup in claims underlying growth normalized for the discrete storm revenue. I mean, it’s a pretty big step-up. So I’m just trying to understand were there any other like onetime benefits in the quarter? Is this mostly about COVID recovery because the factors you cited were things like recovery in international travel, workers’ comp or what I’m really looking for, was there like a pickup in like cross-selling and upselling trends in the business, and the stepped-up growth rate could be sustainable?

Lee Shavel : Thanks, Jeff. So I would say the general dimension has been that it has been the normalization of activity across the business in a couple of fronts, driving activity being one of that. I think that has had a positive improvement in some of our antifraud categories. Elizabeth made reference to some of the return to growth in our workers’ comp businesses. And I think on the property estimating side, I think we’ve seen higher and more normalized levels of activity. Some of that — well, excluding the actual storm revenue, I just — I think we have seen more activity. I’d ask my colleague, Maroun Mourad, who leads our claims business if there’s anything that he’d like to add to that, the general pickup that we’ve seen in the claims business.

Maroun Mourad : Thank you. Thank you, Lee. Thank you, Jeff, for the question. We’ve been experiencing overall healthy growth across the different claims businesses that we’ve got. So in addition to the comments made by Elizabeth and Lee around property estimating solutions as well as the casualty workers’ comp business, we continue to see the customer engagement that is resulting in very healthy growth activity across our antifraud suite of solutions. Thank you.

Operator: Our next question comes from Andrew Steinerman with JPMorgan.

Alexander Hess : This is Alex Hess on for Andrew Steinerman. I want to ask maybe a bit about retention rate and the pressures you saw from Florida? And then as a sort of second part to that question, any sort of operational or balance sheet efficiency statistics you can provide for the standalone insurance Verisk? So to that Florida question, maybe what are — what was your retention rate in ’23 and then — in ’22 and what was it sort of ex Florida?

Lee Shavel : So, Alex, thanks. I would say we are experiencing continued high client retention rates. And I think what we talked about, there’s been one liquidation in Florida. And so that’s something that we have called out. But I don’t think — and I look to my colleague, Neil Spector, here to see if there are other than that situation, whether we have seen any changes in our overall retention on the underwriting side of the business. So I think those remain very solid. We’re watching it carefully because of the risks in Florida. But to date, I think we’ve only had one liquidation. Neil, anything you’d like to add?

Neil Spector : Thanks, Lee. No, I think you summarized it well. I would just say that while there are potential for liquidations down there, there’s also new formations of companies that come into the market because there’s need for coverage, which gives us opportunities. So just — it isn’t a one-way flow of businesses exiting, there’s businesses entering as well, which helps offset some of that.

Lee Shavel : Thank you. And the question, I don’t know on the operational and the balance sheet. Elizabeth, I think, can respond.

Elizabeth Mann : Yes. Thanks for that, Alex. We haven’t — I don’t have any specific stats pulled out on that right now. But I think in general, the insurance business is the most cash flow generative and sort of the most capital efficient of our former businesses. It generates strong free cash flow, negative working capital characteristics and high kind of yields on EBITDA.