Intact ‘well positioned’ to grow with M&A and UK commercial lines in its crosshairs

By Chris Munro

May 9 - (The Insurer) - Intact Financial Corporation is “really well positioned to play offense” in the current challenging economic environment with the company eyeing potential M&A and growth opportunities in the UK commercial lines market, CEO Charles Brindamour has said.

Speaking on Wednesday following publication of Intact’s Q1 2025 earnings, Brindamour said the company anticipates and plans for uncertainty, while it stress tests scenarios ranging from tariffs to broader geopolitical tension.

“We manage our business accordingly,” the executive said.

“From a financial and operational standpoint, not only can we weather the big storms, but we're also really well positioned to play offense in this environment,” Brindamour stated.

Intact executive vice president and chief financial officer Kenneth Anderson said having stress tested various scenarios, the company is “very well positioned to navigate a wide range of economic outcomes” as he highlighted the Toronto-based business’ $3.1 billion of capital margin and a debt to capital ratio that at the end of Q1 2025 stood at close to 19%.

Anderson also pointed to Intact’s “very well diversified” investment portfolio as further evidence of the company’s strong position.

“Common equities are about 10% of the portfolio, over 80% of our debt securities are rated A or better, and the currency exposure to U.S. and GBP also provides a hedge against any Canadian dollar weakening. So overall, our business is very resilient,” he said.

“From the modeling we've done, even in quite severe downside economic scenarios like a prolonged trade war, we're very much in a position to play offense and capture growth opportunities,” Anderson added.

Brindamour highlighted several areas where Intact will play offense.

Firstly, Intact is “on the front foot from a growth point of view,” while the company is also “doubling down on investing in the service we provide to brokers,” Brindamour said.

Secondly, Intact is also making further technology investments.

“Third, and maybe more importantly, when it comes to actual capital deployment because the first two things, not so much capital, but rather using our resources effectively, it means acquisition,” stated Brindamour.

In practice, that means Intact “would love” to deploy capital in both the Canadian and U.S. marketplaces, both from a manufacturing and from a distribution point of view, the CEO said.

“Despite the fact that you hear there's a lot of uncertainty, people are on the sideline, that's not the mindset we're in, and we would be prepared to deploy meaningful capital to consolidate our positions,” Brindamour said.

The Intact chief said the company’s UK business “is performing well.” The business is in the middle of integrating the Direct Line Group acquisition, and while Brindamour said he did not want to add more to what the UK team is already doing, he is interested in growing the company’s commercial lines footprint in the country.

“It's a great market. It's bigger than Canada, lots of similarities, and where we find opportunities because of the uncertainty right now we're ready to go for it," he said.