Chubb (CB) Earnings Call zu Q3 2026: Rekord-EPS und Combined Ratio von 84,1 %

Chubb Limited (NYSE: CB) verbuchte für das am 30. September 2026 endende dritte Quartal starke Versicherungsergebnisse und Kapitalanlageergebnisse. Das operative Kernergebnis belief sich auf 2,98 Milliarden US-Dollar, während der operative Kern-Gewinn je Aktie einen Rekordwert von 7,66 US-Dollar erreichte.

Wichtigste Erkenntnisse

• Das operative Kernergebnis ging um etwa 2 % auf 2,98 Milliarden US-Dollar zurück, was außergewöhnlich geringe Katastrophenschäden im Vorjahresquartal widerspiegelt. Der operative Kern-Gewinn je Aktie stieg um etwa 1 % auf den Rekordwert von 7,66 US-Dollar.
• Das P&C-Zeichnungsergebnis näherte sich 2,1 Milliarden US-Dollar bei einer Combined Ratio von 84,1 %. Die globale P&C-Combined-Ratio ohne Katastrophenschäden lag bei 81,8 %.
• Das bereinigte Netto-Kapitalanlageergebnis erreichte einen Rekordwert von 1,89 Milliarden US-Dollar. Die Rendite des Festverzinsungsportfolios lag bei 5,2 %, während die Wiederanlagerendite zum 30. September durchschnittlich 6,2 % betrug.
• Die gesamten P&C-Prämien stiegen um 1,9 %. Das Segment Overseas General wuchs um 6,7 %, North America Personal Lines legte um 5,3 % zu und das Agrargeschäft verzeichnete ein Plus von mehr als 5 %.
• Die Prämien im Bereich North America Commercial gingen um 2,7 % zurück, da Chubb das Engagement in ausgewählten Sach- und Financial-Lines-Sparten reduzierte und zusätzliche Rückversicherung kaufte. Diese Maßnahmen verringerten das Wachstum um etwa 4,5 Prozentpunkte.
• Das Management rechnet damit, dass sich das Wachstum im Segment North America Commercial in den kommenden Quartalen deutlich verbessern wird, wenn der versicherungstechnische Gegenwind nachlässt und sich die Chancen in der Gewerbeversicherung für den Mittelstand und Kleinunternehmen ausweiten.

Wichtigste Finanzdaten

In den ersten neun Monaten des Jahres 2026 stieg das operative Kernergebnis um 21 % auf 8,6 Milliarden US-Dollar, und der operative Kern-Gewinn je Aktie kletterte um 24,5 % auf 21,94 US-Dollar. Das Rekord-Zeichnungsergebnis von 5,8 Milliarden US-Dollar lag um fast 34 % höher. Die Katastrophenschäden beliefen sich auf insgesamt 1,7 Milliarden US-Dollar, verglichen mit 2,6 Milliarden US-Dollar im gleichen Zeitraum des Jahres 2025.

Der materielle Buchwert je Aktie ohne AOCI wuchs im Quartal um 3,5 %. Bereinigt um AOCI stieg der materielle Buchwert je Aktie im Jahresvergleich um 15,4 %.

Geschäfts- und operative Entwicklung

Overseas General blieb der wichtigste P&C-Wachstumstreiber. Die Prämien im Privatkundengeschäft stiegen um 7,2 %, während die Prämien im Gewerbekundengeschäft um 6,3 % zulegten. Lateinamerika wuchs um 11,7 %, Asien legte um 7,5 % zu und Europa verzeichnete ein Plus von fast 7 %.

Die Prämien im Bereich North America Commercial sanken um 2,7 %. In Chubbs rund 10 Milliarden US-Dollar schweren Sparte für den Mittelstand und Kleinunternehmen stiegen die Prämien um etwa 1 %. Die P&C-Sparten legten um 2,6 % zu bzw. um 4 % nach Bereinigung um eine geringere Prämienanpassung bei der Arbeiterunfallversicherung. Die rund 16 Milliarden US-Dollar schwere Sparte Major Accounts and Specialty verzeichnete einen Rückgang von 5 %; ohne das Sachversicherungsgeschäft stiegen die Prämien um etwa 1 %.

Die Preise in der gewerblichen Sachversicherung in Nordamerika fielen um 4,2 %, während die Preise in der Haftpflichtversicherung (Casualty) um 5,7 % und in den Financial Lines um 2,1 % stiegen. Wie das Management mitteilte, verschärft sich der Wettbewerb in der gesamten gewerblichen P&C-Sparte, insbesondere in den USA und in London, wobei die Preise in mehreren Haftpflichtbereichen nicht mit den Schadenkosten Schritt halten.

Das Privatkundengeschäft für vermögende Kunden in Nordamerika erzielte ein Prämienwachstum von fast 5,5 % und eine Combined Ratio von 60,3 %. Das Management führte dieses Ergebnis auf Risikoselektion, Zeichnungspolitik, Preisgestaltung und unterdurchschnittliche Katastrophenschäden zurück.

Die Prämien und Einlagen im Bereich International Life stiegen um mehr als 15,5 %. International Life erzielte einen Gewinn vor Steuern von 277 Millionen US-Dollar, was einem Plus von 7 % entspricht, während die Prämien von Chubb Worksite Benefits in Nordamerika um mehr als 11,5 % zulegten.

Das Kapitalanlagevermögen überstieg 175 Milliarden US-Dollar, verglichen mit 168 Milliarden US-Dollar im Vorjahr. Festverzinsliche Vermögenswerte machten 88 % des Portfolios aus, während auf aktienorientierte Vermögenswerte 12 % entfielen. Höhere Zinsen führten im Quartal zu realisierten und unrealisierten Nettoverlusten von 4,5 Milliarden US-Dollar; das Management erklärte jedoch, dass sich diese Auswirkungen amortisieren dürften, wenn Vermögenswerte fällig werden und zu höheren Zinssätzen wiederangelegt werden.

Chubb führte im Laufe des Quartals 1,6 Milliarden US-Dollar an die Aktionäre zurück, darunter 1,2 Milliarden US-Dollar in Form von Aktienrückkäufen zu einem Durchschnittspreis von 344,32 US-Dollar sowie 393 Millionen US-Dollar an Dividenden. Die in den ersten neun Monaten zurückgeführten Kapitalmittel beliefen sich auf insgesamt rund 4,5 Milliarden US-Dollar.

Ausblick des Managements

Chubb rechnet weiterhin mit einem effektiven operativen Kernsteuersatz für das Gesamtjahr von 19,5 % bis 20 %. Der Satz für das dritte Quartal lag aufgrund des Ertragsmixes und einmaliger Steuereffekte bei 19,9 %.

Das Management gab keine spezifische Prognose für das bereinigte Netto-Kapitalanlageergebnis ab, erklärte jedoch, dass die festverzinsliche Komponente angesichts des attraktiveren Wiederanlageumfelds weiter wachsen dürfte.

Ohne Katastrophenschäden und Währungseffekte zeigte sich das Management zuversichtlich, mittelfristig ein weiterhin starkes Wachstum des operativen Ergebnisses und des Gewinns je Aktie sowie ein zweistelliges Wachstum des materiellen Buchwerts zu erzielen. Diese Aussagen wurden als Erwartungen des Managements und nicht als formelle Gewinnprognosen dargestellt.

Risiken und Beobachtungspunkte

• Der Wettbewerb in der gewerblichen Schaden- und Unfallversicherung nimmt zu, insbesondere in den USA und in London. Nach Angaben des Managements tragen zusätzliches alternatives Kapital, Sidecars, Broker-Facilities und MGAs zu Überkapazitäten bei.
• Die Schadenkosteninflation in der Haftpflichtversicherung übersteigt in mehreren Bereichen weiterhin die allgemeine Inflation, während die Preisgestaltung nicht durchweg Schritt hält.
• Chubb reduziert oder rückversichert ausgewählte Engagements in der Sachversicherung und in den Financial Lines, bei denen Preise oder Bedingungen unzureichend sind, was das kurzfristige Prämienwachstum begrenzt.
• KI-Haftpflicht ist ein neu entstehendes Risiko, das in der traditionellen Haftpflichtzeichnung noch nicht vollständig berücksichtigt ist. Das Management rechnet damit, dass die Branche Deckungsklarstellungen, Ausschlüsse, separate Produkte und spezifischere Zeichnungsstandards entwickeln wird.
• Steigende Zinsen erhöhen die Wiederanlageerträge, können aber auch zu unrealisierten Verlusten im Festverzinsungsportfolio führen.
• Rechenzentrumsprojekte stehen vor potenziellen Verzögerungen im Zusammenhang mit Genehmigungen, Energieversorgung, Arbeitskräften und Lieferketten, was sich darauf auswirkt, wann Versicherungsmöglichkeiten zeichnungsfähig werden.

Wichtigste Punkte aus der Fragerunde für Analysten

Das Management erklärte, dass sich zusätzliche Rückversicherungskäufe auf die Sachversicherung und ausgewählte Financial Lines konzentrieren. Diese Vereinbarungen ermöglichen es Chubb, Kundenbeziehungen aufrechtzuerhalten und gleichzeitig das Risiko zu streuen.

Die sinkende Betriebskostenquote von Chubb spiegelt die digitale Transformation und breiter angelegte Effizienzprogramme wider. Wie das Management mitteilte, werden Technologie, Daten, Algorithmen, Large Language Models und agentische Tools in den Bereichen Underwriting, Marketing, Schadenabwicklung, Finanzen und Vertrieb eingesetzt.

In Bezug auf Asien hob das Management Chancen hervor, die sich aus Investitionen in Lieferketten, der Digitalisierung, einer wachsenden Mittelschicht sowie dem Wachstum bei kleinen und mittleren Unternehmen ergeben. Chubb verzeichnete in seinen P&C- und Lebensversicherungsaktivitäten in China und Hongkong trotz eines schwachen inländischen Umfelds ein zweistelliges Wachstum.

Chubb ist in den Bereichen Bauversicherung für Rechenzentren, Transportversicherung (Marine) und Kautionsversicherung (Surety) aktiv. Das Management beschrieb die künftige Pipeline als bedeutend, wies jedoch darauf hin, dass der Versicherungsschutz in der Regel erst nach Baubeginn verbindlich gezeichnet wird.

Abwicklungsgewinne für frühere Versicherungsjahre in aktiven Gesellschaften beliefen sich auf insgesamt 562 Millionen US-Dollar, bestehend aus 575 Millionen US-Dollar an positiver Abwicklung im Kurzlaufbereich und 13 Millionen US-Dollar an negativer Abwicklung im Langlaufbereich. Das Management erklärte, dass die Bewegung im Langlaufbereich gering war und sich hauptsächlich auf ältere Schadensjahre, etwa 2019 bis 2022, konzentrierte. Die gesamten Schadenrückstellungen überstiegen 71 Milliarden US-Dollar.

Hinsichtlich der Kapitalallokation betonte das Management, Kapital für Risiken und Chancen vorzuhalten und gleichzeitig die Kapitalrückzahlungen an die Aktionäre mit Investitionen in das Versicherungs- und Kapitalanlagegeschäft auszubalancieren. Das Unternehmen erklärte, dass im Zusammenhang mit aktuellen Marktspekulationen derzeit keine Übernahme bevorsteht.

Vollständiges Transkript der Telefonkonferenz zu den Quartalszahlen

Vollständiges Transkript der Telefonkonferenz

Ausführungen des Managements

Operator

Thank you for standing by. My name is Jale, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Chubb Limited Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] I'd now like to turn the conference over to Susan Spivak, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations. You may begin.

Susan Spivak Bernstein

Thank you, and welcome to our September 30, 2026, third quarter earnings conference call. Our report today will contain forward-looking statements, including statements relating to the company's performance, pricing and business mix, growth opportunities and economic and market conditions, which are all subject to risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ materially. See our recent SEC filings, earnings release and financial supplement, which are all available on our website at investors.chubb.com for more information on factors that could affect these matters.

We will also refer today to non-GAAP financial measures, reconciliations of which to the most direct comparable GAAP measures and related details are provided in our earnings press release and financial supplement.

Now I'd like to introduce our speakers. First, we have Evan Greenberg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; followed by Peter Enns, our Chief Financial Officer. Then we will take your questions. Also with us to assist with your questions are several members of our management team.

And now it is my pleasure to turn the call over to Evan.

Evan G. Greenberg

Good morning. As you could see, we had a really strong quarter. Our sources and quality of earnings, starting with world-class underwriting margins speak to Chubb's excellent competitive profile, including our geographic and business diversification, our growing invested assets and an enduring culture of underwriting discipline, a hallmark of who we are. These distinguishing attributes have all contributed to a long record of sustainable and growing value creation. P&C underwriting, investment and life income results led to core operating earnings of $2.98 billion or a record $7.66 per share. That was down about 2% and up about 1%, respectively, due to exceptionally light cat losses last year.

From a more meaningful perspective, looking to the first 9 months of the year, core operating income was $8.6 billion, up 21% from the prior year, and core operating EPS was $21.94, up 24.5% from last year. Annualized core operating return on tangible equity was 21.6% for the quarter, and core operating ROE was 14.9%. For the quarter, P&C underwriting income of nearly $2.1 billion led to a combined ratio of 84.1%. We had strong contributions from all of our businesses. Year-to-date, we have produced record underwriting income of $5.8 billion, up nearly 34%. Our global P&C ex cat combined ratio was a world-class 81.8%, essentially flat with the prior year, and included a reduction in our loss ratio and our admin ratio, offset by an increase in acquisition ratio. This speaks to our increasing efficiencies and mix of business.

On the investment side of our business, adjusted net investment income was a record $1.89 billion, supported by a materially improved fixed income investment environment and record cash flows. Fixed income related exposure is 88% of our invested asset and equity related is 12%. Our current and future operating income benefits from a rising interest rate environment, which we have expected for some time given growing fiscal deficits, inflation and the public and private sector competition for money.

We positioned ourselves with that in mind by maintaining a moderate duration and a conservative approach to credit quality. We are a buy-and-hold investor of a high-quality investment-grade portfolio. Rising rates produced a third quarter mark of $4.5 billion in net realized and unrealized losses. Given our duration and higher reinvestment rates, the mark will amortize away reasonably quickly. It is a femoral. The third quarter fixed income portfolio yield was 5.2%, and our current new money rate averaged 6.2% as of September 30.

On the alternative asset side, as was publicly announced in the quarter, strategic holdings in our holding company partnership with KKR agreed to sell our investment in USI Insurance Services to Aon. This is expected to result in a realized gain of $460 million on an investment of $740 million. Our invested assets stands at over $175 billion, up from $168 billion a year ago.

Life income of $369 million this quarter was up about 11.5% from last year. Year-to-date, life income is just over $1 billion, up over 9% from a year earlier. Peter is going to have more to say about financial items.

Now turning to underwriting, pricing and growth. The substantial majority of our businesses are growing with the balance flat or purposely shrinking due to inadequate pricing or terms. There's nothing new there. In the quarter, we again shed more property and financial lines exposure, which affected growth. The most visible example again is in the U.S. North America middle and small commercial grew in the quarter, as did North America personal lines in agriculture. Overseas general had good growth across all major regions both consumer and commercial, particularly middle and small commercial, while North America E&S and major accounts shrink. This pattern of growth, again, speaks to the breadth of our business and our diversified sources of growth and opportunity globally.

While total P&C premiums were up 1.9%, overseas general grew 6.7%. North America Personal Lines was up 5.3% and agriculture was up over 5%. Agriculture was a meaningful contributor to growth this quarter. North America Commercial was down 2.7%, impacted again by large account and E&S property and financial lines, where we non-renewed certain business and purchased additional reinsurance. The adverse impact on growth was about 4.5 points. And with that said, I fully expect North America commercial growth to improve materially in future quarters.

In terms of pricing, the market continues to grow more competitive in commercial P&C across the globe, in particular, the U.S. and London. Beyond property, competitive market conditions are spreading to more casualty lines, where pricing in numerous areas is failing to keep pace with loss costs, which, while steady, continued to well outpace general inflation. There is a lot of hungry and extremely naive capacity available. Our broad diversification, including a deep local presence in so many countries and lines of business leave us relatively well positioned with many areas of opportunity.

With that as a baseline, I'm going to give you more color on the quarter by division and region. In international P&C, a $17 billion business, our consumer-related businesses, both A&H and Personal Lines were up 7.2%, and commercial was up 6.3$, Latin America grew 11.7%, Asia grew 7.5% and Europe grew almost 7%. In our London wholesale business, which is about 10% of international P&C, premiums were up 13.5% for the quarter, benefiting in particular from our Gulf War marine-related activities.

Turning back to North America. Premiums in our $10 billion middle market and small commercial division grew about 1% with P&C lines up 2.6% or 4% on adjusting for a smaller annual workers' comp-related premium adjustment than we had last year. And middle market financial lines was down 5.9%, or up about 1.8% adjusted for exposure change from additional use of reinsurance and nonrenewal of inadequately priced business. In our $16 billion major accounts in specialty division, premiums declined 5%, and adjusting for property were up about 1%. Gross premium pricing in North America for commercial property was down 4.2%, casualty was up 5.7% and financial lines was up 2.1%. Going a step further for the business we wrote, property pricing was down 11% in shared and later major in specialty and up a little over 0.5% in mid and small.

On the consumer side of North America, our nearly $8.5 billion high net worth personal lines business, a clear market leader in that category, had another really good quarter, with premium growth of almost 5.5%. Our combined ratio was 60.3%, which speaks to the strength of our risk selection, underwriting and sophistication and pricing and, of course, a lighter than average quarter for cats.

In our international life insurance business, premiums and deposits rose over 15.5%. The vast majority of our life exposure, as you know, is in Asia, and the majority of growth is coming in North Asia, meaning China, Hong Kong, Korea and Taiwan, though I'd like to call out Thailand as well this quarter. Premiums in our North America Chubb Worksite Benefits business were up over 11.5%. Our International Life division produced $277 million of pretax income in the quarter, up 7% from last year, with income up almost 11% year-to-date.

In sum, our global diversification, our presence and capabilities globally, our large and growing invested asset, along with rising interest rates and our operating discipline provide us with strong margins, continued growth opportunities and sustainability of value creation. We are a consistent compounder of wealth and an all-weather firm with many sources of opportunity on both the liability and asset side of the balance sheet, and we are patient.

Cats and FX aside, as I look out over the medium term, I am confident in our ability to continue to outperform and to generate strong growth in operating earnings and EPS, and most important, double-digit growth in tangible book value.

Now I'm going to turn the call back over to Peter and then we're going to come back and we're going to take your questions.

Peter Enns

Thank you, Evan, and good morning. Our third quarter results were driven by strong underlying business performance and continued strength in our investment results. We continue to effectively manage our balance sheet and remain in a financially strong position with book value of $73 billion and excellent liquidity as evidenced by a record $12.8 billion in adjusted operating cash flow over the last 9 months.

During the quarter, we issued approximately CHF 400 million of debt at a weighted average cost of 1.1% at an average term of 5 years. The use of proceeds is for general corporate purposes, which includes the repayment and refinancing of debt.

For the quarter, we returned $1.6 billion of capital to shareholders, including $1.2 billion in share repurchases at an average price of $344.32 and $393 million in dividends. For the first 9 months, we have returned about $4.5 billion of capital to shareholders.

Book and tangible book value per share, excluding AOCI, grew 2.6% and 3.5%, respectively, for the quarter. And tangible book value per share adjusting for AOCI was up 15.4% from the prior year.

Pretax catastrophe losses were $705 million for the quarter, principally from a variety of weather-related events globally and an earthquake in Latin America. Cat losses were $1.7 billion through 9 months versus $2.6 billion over the same period last year.

Pretax prior period development in the quarter in our active companies was favorable $562 million, comprising $575 million of favorable development in short-tail lines and $13 million of unfavorable development in long-tail lines. As you know, and Evan has said repeatedly, we are slow to recognize favorable development and quick to recognize unfavorable development. Our corporate runoff portfolio had adverse development of $51 million, predominantly in environmental related. Overall, our loss reserves, which are now over $71 billion are conservatively constructed and remain extremely strong.

Our paid-to-incurred ratio for the quarter and year-to-date was 80% and 86%, respectively.

Our core operating effective tax rate was 19.9% for the quarter, which is near the top end of our previously guided range due to a shift in mix of income and the impact of discrete tax items. We continue to expect our core operating effective tax rate for the full year to be in the range of 19.5% to 20%. Effective this quarter, we have excluded the amortization of certain M&A-related intangible assets from our core operating income. This change, which has a de minimis impact on growth and ROE, better represents the true economics of past acquisitions and improves our comparability with peers globally.

All prior periods have been recast accordingly. I'll now turn the call back over to Susan.

Susan Spivak Bernstein

Thank you, Peter. At this point, we're happy to take your questions. Operator, first question, please.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from the line of Meyer Shields of KBW.

Fragen und Antworten

Meyer Shields

Evan, I was hoping you can get a little bit more color on the increasing risk that you're transferring to reinsurers?

Evan G. Greenberg

In what regard?

Meyer Shields

So you mentioned that one of the headwinds to North America commercial growth was more reinsurance purchasing. And I was wondering which lines that's focused on?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. It's -- well, as you know, and I think we discussed it, it's in financial lines, on certain areas of financial lines and it's in property. In both of those, we took advantage of opportunities to place additional reinsurance, which also gives us the opportunity to maintain presence and provide service and coverage to customers and at the same time, spread risk. And it was in those 2 areas.

Meyer Shields

Okay. Great. That's helpful. And second question, we saw admin expenses actually down year-over-year again in North America Commercial, and I was hoping to get a sense as to whether there's anything unusual there or this is just technology-based efficiencies?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. And let's put the lens beyond North America. Look at it globally. And I think that zoom out of North America and just look at the company as a whole, North America included, our operating expense ratio has been trending lower and continues to improve. Our digital transformation programs and other efficiencies are visibly appearing. And that's all around employing foundational tech and data and smart layer of technology, algorithmic, large language and agentic-related. And we're on track in terms of the medium and longer-term efficiencies and improvement to our competitive profile, which goes beyond efficiencies that we have described in the past.

And by the way it's impacting underwriting, it's impacting marketing, claims, finance, sales, all areas of the company. And it's impacting broadly across the globe.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Heimermann of Citi.

Matthew Heimermann

I guess, Evan, I appreciate your perspective on the current debate related to coverage for AI liability, which, from my perspective, seems quite nuanced, although the brokers seem to suggested status quo is quite reasonable. So maybe more specifically, how to think about the utility of new stand-alone rates and forms versus simply incremental changes to language or sublimits in existing forms versus changes at all?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. Thank you for that question. Look, AI liability, it's all over the the papers generally. It's emerging as a topic beyond the insurance industry. And AI liability is a growing in emerging exposure. That is not contemplated in casualty underwriting really to date. And it needs to be understood, it needs to be managed and it needs to be addressed. That's what we call underwriting, and that's what the insurance company does.

In managing the risk, I imagine we're going to have a combination of coverage clarifications, ultimately, exclusions and separate AI-related liability coverages. This will all emerge along with underwriting and pricing to discern between risks. AI-related liability exposures will vary between insureds and type of insurance. And frankly, when you think beyond that, to assist business generally, and add to greater certainty overall in the liability environment as it emerges, I can imagine a regimen around model certification standards emerging. I can imagine best practices in management and governance of AI and agentics emerging quickly and evolving from there. And these will be tools that will also assist in insurance underwriting.

So while that's a mouthful, I think that gives you all the elements of how the industry will approach and address AI liability. As an industry, we have to put our arms around this. And frankly, this is -- we've had to do this with emerging liabilities over the last 50 years, and there's a pretty good template to follow.

Matthew Heimermann

There's a number of follow-ups I would love to explore on that, but I think in the interest of time and other topics. I wonder if you or Peter can clarify, just in the Asia Life production this quarter, was there anything either in the quarter or the prior year quarter that was impacting the comps there? And just relative to whatever you think the underlying expectation for us should be with historically, it's been pretty strong production?

Peter Enns

Yes. In the third quarter -- sorry, this is Peter. In the third quarter of '25, there was an acquisition of effectively a closed block of business in New Zealand. We disclosed that the impact -- the impact is approximately 8%. So the production really is more like 10.5% on a comparable basis for net written premium, which we think is more at a normal level.

Evan G. Greenberg

It was well over $100 million last year. It's very large.

Peter Enns

And disclosed that.

Operator

SP1 Your next question comes from the line of Brian Meredith of UBS.

Brian Meredith

First question, I'm wondering if you could unpack your comments about the improving growth in North America commercial a little bit. Is it because the headwinds in property are going away? Or are there really emerging opportunities in the North America commercial business?

Evan G. Greenberg

I think it's a combination of both. The negative impact from the actions that we have taken will diminish and areas of opportunity, the impact of those will increase middle and small commercial, in particular. But our advantages from product breadth, local geography, massive capabilities up and down the chain from largest companies to small business and our data and technology and the power of it, that continues to emerge in spite of and, of course, in context of soft market. So I see it between diminishing headwinds and our own opportunities.

Brian Meredith

Great. And then my follow-up question, I'm just curious, Evan, can we get your perspective on some of this alternative capital that continues to kind of come into the industry, particularly as it relates to casualty side cars and some of these broker facilities? Is this something you see having an impact on market conditions here going forward?

Evan G. Greenberg

Well, of course. There's -- what drives cycles, drive cycles and insurances supply/demand. And so side cars, broker facilities, line-follow facilities, more MGAs with capital behind them other than professional insurance and frankly, a lot with professional insurance behind it. This is all throwing out of balance the supply relative to demand. And it's a lot of very naive capacity. And even even where it's other than traditional insurance, it's investor capital. There's 2 brands of it to me. There is one brand where they're cleverly going to make a trade even in casualty sidecars. And they're going to try to pass or they have it arrange to pass the tail back to the carrier that's fronting it, who's going to end up holding the trash and they may make a turn. On the other hand, I think a lot of that clever capital doesn't understand the pricing versus the loss cost environment. And I don't think they're going to end up making the return that they think they might make.

But we've been living in a world where the cost of money is cheap. And there's a lot of money looking for absolute return, not risk adjusted. As you know, generally, the world is beginning to change that way. But in the meantime, a lot of it has found its way or a fraction of it has found its way into insurance as sort of an alternative investment asset class. It has different forms now than we've seen to some degree in the past, but the themes are the same.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Bob Huang of Morgan Stanley.

Jian Huang

I'd like to kind of unpack a little bit about your commentaries around overseas general insurance noticed that several countries when you called out were in Asia for the quarter, specifically Thailand as such. Just given the prolonged conflict in Iran and just oil price volatility has been fairly long lasting so far, can you maybe help us think about your view on Asia opportunities? And has that changed over the year so far in 2026? Just curious how you think about the go forward there first.

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. Bob, thank you. First of all, the countries that I cited, that was in the Life business. I didn't cite countries in overseas general P&C.

Jian Huang

Sorry, yes.

Evan G. Greenberg

But if I did, I would cite those plus even a larger number of countries. I just returned with my colleagues from 2 weeks in Asia. We were through Southeast Asia, China and Korea. So let me help you with your model. There are 2 regions of the world that are really growing right now more exceptionally that is North America, particularly the United States, and Asia. And when you look at the growth in Asia, Southeast Asia, Korea, Taiwan, a lot of it is tied to the U.S. capital investment sort of super cycle that we're in as we build out AI and AI-related infrastructure and invest to remake our economy that way. Asian countries are a beneficiary of that. They're all tied into the supply chain.

Asia is growing, and I see sustainability. It varies by country, but the dynamism that I see and the opportunity that presents for Chubb's business, rising middle class, digitization, growth of small and midsized businesses, I was in Vietnam, it's a beehive of development. Thailand overall, though it has its idiosyncrasies related to domestic credit and maybe underperforms the region, Thailand is still very solid. Singapore, Malaysia is growing well. Taiwan, our business in Hong Kong and China, in spite of a soft domestic environment, p&C and Life is growing double digit. The Korean economy the Korean economy is growing between 3% and 4% right now, again, tied to the supply chain of the United States, in particular.

So I'm bullish on China. I'm bullish on Asia right now on both medium and longer term and shorter term. Of course, it has a certain volatility signature to it, emerging markets do, but overall, our presence, our capabilities, the breadth of our business, the depth of it through countries, I'm very optimistic for Chubb in Asia.

Jian Huang

I really appreciate that. Maybe just pivot a little bit. I know you kind of talked about cyber liabilities. But if we were to think about data center investments, data center constructions, right, AI build-out, can you maybe help us talk about your exposure there, just maybe the thoughts on the risk maybe the insurance industry is taking on? Just curious your thoughts there if possible?

Evan G. Greenberg

Let's unpack it a couple of it. Right now in the cycle of data center development, particularly hyperscalers and medium sized, we're more in the construction phase with the operation phase more in front of us than behind us. That's to come. A lot of projects announced only -- as you know, only -- so only a percentage of those are actually shovel in the ground right now and delays due to a combination of things, permitting, energy, labor, supply chain, et cetera. But we are quite active. We're quite active in the physical property-related construction. We're active in marine surety. It's a huge opportunity for us in surety. We've written quite a bit, but more important, it's the pipeline of what's outstanding to bind because you don't really bind until the shovel goes in the ground. And that's in front of us, as I said, with many projects that are delayed.

When you think about values, and I think you're alluding to that in concentration of exposure, we manage it technically no differently than we manage any other concentration of exposure. We manage how much we could imagine that we'd have as a loss from a single event, and we imagine that across [indiscernible]. So it's technical, it's engineering and I'm comfortable with the way that Chubb is approaching this.

Operator

Your next question comes from...

Evan G. Greenberg

And by the way, we're a leader across the board globally in data center development. We have the broadest capabilities.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Ryan Tunis of Cantor.

Ryan Tunis

So North America commercial, have untested about 1 point of underlying loss ratio deterioration year-to-date. Is it fair to attribute that magnitude, the impact of pricing versus loss trend or is there anything else going on there?

Evan G. Greenberg

No, I wouldn't say that it's a reduction in property.

Ryan Tunis

So there's a mix shift element?

Evan G. Greenberg

That's what it is. You've seen the reduction in property. And so property as a percentage is down. That's the whole loss ratio.

Ryan Tunis

And I guess relatedly, just as a follow-up. Overseas General, we're not seeing a deterioration dynamic so far year-to-date. So just curious some color around the stability there just given the pricing environment.

Evan G. Greenberg

Well, it's -- there is no one pricing environment in overseas general. Overseas general is insures the world it's throughout Europe throughout the U.K., Europe is more stable than the U.K. is. Our growth in middle and small commercial business throughout the globe. And Latin America, goes to a different beat than Europe or the U.K. does. And it varies by country. And again, it's more middle and small commercial for us there. And then the same with Asia Pacific. And so that's one part of the story. But the other part of the story, which I think is more important is the balance between consumer and commercial within overseas general.

Consumer is growing more quickly. The size of the consumer business relative to the commercial business. So large account is only a piece. And when you get to the consumer -- when you get the balance, which most of overseas general and commercial is mid and small, and then you get to the consumer side, which is half the business, it's accident and health, which grew. By the way, globally, our A&H business grew at about 6% this quarter. It's personal lines overseas, which is everything from automobile insurance in Mexico, we were the #3 writer insuring over 2 million autos to insuring cell phones and computers in Asia and automobile in Thailand and Malaysia and homeowners and high net worth insurance in Australia and the U.K. It's a variety of opportunities in a huge world out there where we have fabulous capability.

So our direct marketing business in Asia and Latin America, we are the largest direct marketers of insurance digitally and by phone of consumer businesses up and down the chain as I explained it from lower middle income people to middle-middle income.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Andrew Kligerman of TD Cowen.

Andrew Kligerman

High net worth personal lines, again, a spectacular quarter, premiums up over 5%, combined reported at [ 60. ] Any changes, Evan, in the competitive landscape with these types of returns with AI coming into the picture? I mean, do you see these kinds of results as sustainable over the intermediate to long term?

Evan G. Greenberg

I do. High net worth is the business we do. It's not about price you charge as much as it is about the richness of the coverage and the services you provide. It's about the complexity of those coverages. It's really like selling the small commercial or middle-sized commercial account and the management of it. This is not something you buy over the Internet or some agentic shops for you for insurance. This is far more bespoke and it is a trust business. It is an agent-driven business and relationship business between the customer and us. This is not a trade, these are our customers, our long-term clients. So I'll start with that.

Yes, there are always cyclical competitive pressures that emerged because cat reinsurance becomes cheaper, per risk insurance becomes cheaper. And so competitors may employ more of that to on [indiscernible] business at a cheaper price on the margin. But overall, I see steady as she goes with some variability now and again. And that's it.

Andrew Kligerman

Got it. And then just moving over to reserve adequacy and prior year development was also spectacular. But in the long-term lines, I think Peter called out [ $13 million ] adverse. Could you share with us any color on the, say, '21 to '25 accident years? And just your general confidence going forward in longer-tail lines and how adequate those reserves are?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. And thank you for that question. Look, as Peter said, I've repeated it [indiscernible], we're slow over the years. We're slow to recognize favorable development and -- but very quick to recognize adverse, casualty underwriting is not for optimists. And as you know, the stinger is in the tail in development. The more recent accident years, while they may be developing more favorably, we -- they're green. We wouldn't touch them. While the development that we did see was in more older accident years and think more '19 to '22. And by the way, the amount was reasonably modest. When I look at our overall reserves as a percentage, it was very small.

I think that maybe gives you the kind of color you're looking for.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Tracy Benguigui of Wolfe Research.

Tracy Benguigui

The market yield rose to 6.2% from 5.5% in June, and you extended your duration 5 years from 4.8 years. So that's remarkable. I'm wondering what your expectations are on adjusted net investment income going forward? I thought I would ask, since this is the second quarter, we stopped getting guide for that.

Peter Enns

Tracy, it's Peter. And as you just said, we're not providing specific guidance. The way I'd frame it is, the reinvestment environment as Evan said in his speech, is much more attractive. When you look at this quarter's results, how I'd frame it as we had extremely strong performance of fixed income related net investment income and alternatives, in particular, PEE, was actually less than what might be normal. And as you know, it's very, very volatile that specific asset class. And so over time, we're confident that will continue to return well. So with that as a backdrop, I think you can have a perspective around certainly the fixed income piece of this continuing to grow.

Tracy Benguigui

Maybe just a quick follow-up. I know Brian had touched on this in the beginning of the questions about the North American commercial growth improving materially in future quarters. But maybe you could just unpack the glide path there. I'm wondering how much of the finishing line you've reached in terms of the underwriting actions you're taking in financial lines and large account property?

Evan G. Greenberg

Nice drive, Tracy. I gave as much as I go that.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Gregory Peters of Raymond James.

Charles Peters

Money. So stepping back to the technology piece. It seems like with some rising frequency, we keep hearing about security protocols being violated breaching of data security, et cetera. You're managing a global enterprise your data assets are unique and special to your company. Maybe you could just give us some perspective on how you're managing the data securities, large language models and these other tools. are out there? And how are you protecting your data assets?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. Look, we're employing all of the best practices around governance and management of not simply our data, but the tools that we employ at the smart layer, which is algorithmic, but more to the point, large language model and agentics and how we control and limit what they can do, where they can do it, how they can do it, how we instruct for it and then protecting our own perimeter and multiple layers of detection and defense against third-party or external use of agentics and AI that could [indiscernible] Chubb's owned data or systems.

We invest significantly in this. We pay very close attention to it. It's fundamental to how we think. And by the way, and to give you a sense, it's evolved over a long period of time. Think about actuarial models. Before AI, we've always had to employ model management for regulatory point of view and for our own use to create governance and management over the efficacy of those models, traditional [indiscernible]. As those evolve past algorithmic and to AI related, we have used the same template and the same governance processes. We've improved the tools. We've improved the techniques that we use and the automation and humans in the loop to manage all of that, and it continues the harnesses and our ability to provide instruction precisely, all continues to evolve.

Charles Peters

Okay. I guess it's kind of building on the comments you've made. But as I think about everything that's going on and the new money rates jumping up over 100 basis points from where you were, what it currently is in your book yield. And I'm just -- you mentioned naive capital, there's these facilities, there's these casualty sidecars. Do you think it's possible that we could be pivoting to an environment where we're sort of cash flow underwriting on casualty and longer term longer-tail liability business considering that these inflationary pressures and higher interest rates?

Evan G. Greenberg

I think only on the margin. When I look at loss cost inflation versus new money rates, and I look at pricing, it doesn't -- it's not hard for me to work out the math. You're not cash flow underwriting at a 10% or 12% interest rate.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of David Motemaden of Evercore ISI.

David Motemaden

Just a question on North America commercial. So Evan, you've talked a bit this call and in the Qs just on how the property growth or the mix change from property is driving the margin or the loss ratio deterioration there. I guess with that drag, I guess, abating a little bit, how should we think about the margin trajectory from here?

Evan G. Greenberg

I don't give guidance on margins. But I feel very good about our margins. And I feel, as you saw in the commentary, our sustainability of value creation, including market, which includes margin, I feel very good about it. But I'm not going to give you more than that, David.

And by the way, you would be well served as others would, not to simply over-obsess about North America commercial and considerable of that in the round as one company and then imagine all the handles to pull.

David Motemaden

Yes. No, I hear you on that. Maybe just following up here. The growth has moderated a bit just for the company overall, still solid, but it has slowed a bit. Capital return, if I look at it, it's unchanged year-on-year roughly, at least on the buyback. How are you thinking about capital allocation here and just given the current market environment?

Evan G. Greenberg

Peter is going to answer a part of that, and then I'm going to come back on actually answer probably another part.

Peter Enns

David, we've been pretty consistent around preserving capital for risk and opportunity. If you look back over the last while and it hasn't really changed this year, you saw our buyback ticked up this quarter. We've been returning in the range of 50%, and that's not a rule we have, it's an outcome. But look, we look at the investment environment and think it's really, really strong. And so we think about our capital in terms of return to shareholders, but we also think about how we can deploy it in our insurance business and in particular, right now in our investment business, which includes both the current, of course, fixed income environment as well as our old strategy, which is very differentiated.

Evan G. Greenberg

I think that says it all. We're getting -- and I want to add that we're getting paid to hold the capital and money doesn't burn a hole in our pocket. And there is no event on the horizon related to acquisition or any of that we know is speculated. We actually enjoy the invested asset and the growth of it and the accretion to shareholder value that it produces. It is a major part of our business is our investment business.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Alex Scott of Barclays.

Taylor Scott

I had one on casualty. As we're seeing casualty pricing come under a little bit more pressure. And I think maybe for a few quarters been under loss cost trend. Any specific actions that may need to be taken there? I'm just trying to understand if we need to consider that in the context of some of the growth discussion from earlier.

Evan G. Greenberg

We're underwriters. We write up and down the chain large companies to small companies, all kinds of industries, all kinds of casualty from primary to access, to professional, to construction, to more types of casualty for more types of industries and more geographies than you probably can imagine. And as underwriters were conscious of the risk environment of the loss cost environment, which we then match the terms and pricing, and we're nimble. And I think that probably answers your question. I'm not sure what you're asking me beyond that.

Taylor Scott

Yes. No, that's helpful. Second question also [indiscernible] related. I heard you the comments on small commercial and that continuing to be a good growth focus for you. Could you give us a taste of some of the things you're doing, whether it's expansion of distribution, just any taste of what will propel that growth?

Evan G. Greenberg

Yes. It's small commercial. It's lower middle market, it's middle market. A combination of a very local geographic reach within countries because that's how it's done, whether it is in North America, or frankly, it's in Malaysia, it's the breadth of product, it's our industry practices, which is a real secret sauce for job, where coverages and the amalgamation of coverages are tailored for different industries to their specific needs, to industry experts that we have that represent those industries. So that plus technology the amount of data that we have that give us insight into risk selection and pricing. And then the technology to enable the local reach in relationship and a compelling proposition to both quote it quickly, issue it with a few questions, service it quickly, match to the human-to-human of agent to company relationship on a local basis, that is who Chubb is. And the opportunity in that and the scale advantages that we have around because that give us for data and for know-how that we can spread around from whether it's the West Coast of the United States to the Southwest of the United States or spreading from Asia to Europe or United States to Europe. Our ability to do that and the scale advantage to invest in technology and use data to inform broadly that is a whole market advantage for Chubb. That is in enduring.

Operator

Thank you. That's all the time that we have today for questions. I will now pass it back over to Susan for closing remarks.

Susan Spivak Bernstein

Thank you, everyone, for joining us today. If you have any follow-up questions, we will be around to take your calls. Enjoy the day. And once again, thank you. Bye-bye.

Operator

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.