QBE streamlining lifts profit
QBE Insurance Group has lifted first-half net profit by four per cent to $US358 million ($496 million), helped by higher average premiums across its operations and a more streamlined business structure.
Excluding the Latin American business that is being held for sale, net profit was also up four per cent to $US370 million.
The insurance giant said its group-wide premium rate increased 4.6 per cent in the six months to June 30, while gross written premiums were up one per cent to $US7.9 billion.
QBE announced the sale of its Latin American operations to Zurich earlier this year, as it shifted focus to the Asiarose Pacific and North America units. It also recently offloaded its travel insurance business to health insurer NIB Holdings Ltd for $25 million.
The company’s adjusted combined operating ratio – a key measure of profitability – to 95.8 per cent, in the middle of its guidance for a ratio of 95 to 97.5 per cent.
However, investment returns were down to $US287 million, from $US424 million a year earlier.
The group has reiterated its guidance for full-year investment return to be between 2.25 and 2.75 per cent, but narrowed its guidance range for full-year combined ratio at 95 to 97 per cent. QBE declared a partiallyfranked interim dividend of 22 cents a share, unchanged from a year earlier.
On Monday, the company also reaffirmed its commitment to the $1 billion share buyback over three years that it launched in 2017. TREASURY Wine Estates has posted a 34 per cent jump in full-year net profit led by surging demand in Asia.
Net profit for the year to June 30 rose to $360.3 million, from $269.1 million a year earlier, as the company boosted margins by focusing on higher end products and cost control.
Revenue was down 1.5 per cent at $2.5 billion.
The world’s biggest listed winemaker, which owns premium wine Penfolds as well as major labels Wolf Blass and Lindeman’s, has been shifting its focus to premiumisation”.
Treasury Wine’s net sales revenue per case rose 7.1 per cent. The company said margins rose 2 percentage points in the Americas, 3.1 percentage points in Europe and 3.9 percentage points in Australia and New Zealand, driven by sales in higher-end Masstige brand products.
Earnings growth in Asia was up 37 per cent to $205.2 million, helped by a broadened brand portfolio and higher volumes. “portfolio
Chief executive Michael Clarke said the shift in focus towards exporting premium wine would equate to a profitable outlook from 2018-19.
“We have the wine, the brands, the business models and the organisational talent to propel our company into its next phase of growth,” he said.
The company reaffirmed full-year guidance of 25 per cent growth in earnings before interest tax and selling and general expenses, and said it is still targeting an EBITS margin of 25 per cent.