Earnings Call Transcript - CB Q1 2024

Operator, Operator

Thank you for your patience. My name is Eric, and I will be your conference operator today. I would like to welcome everyone to the Chubb Limited First Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. I will now turn the call over to Karen Beyer, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations. Please proceed.

Karen Beyer, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our March 31, 2024, First Quarter Earnings Conference Call. Our report today will contain forward-looking statements, including statements relating to company performance, pricing and business mix, growth opportunities, and economic and market conditions, which are subject to risks and uncertainties and actual results may differ materially. Please see our recent SEC filings, earnings release, and financial supplement, which are 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. I'd like to introduce our speakers this morning. First, we have Evan Greenberg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; followed by Peter Enns, our Chief Financial Officer. We'll then take your questions. Also with us to assist with your questions are several members of our management team. And now it's my pleasure to turn the call over to Evan.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Good morning. We had an excellent start to the year. Core operating income was up double-digit, driven by all three sources of income. P&C underwriting income was up over 15% with a published combined ratio of 86%. Investment income was up more than 23% and life insurance income was up almost 10%. We produced double-digit premium revenue growth from across the globe with strong results in our commercial and consumer P&C and international life businesses. Core operating income was up over 20% to $2.2 billion and operating EPS was up nearly 23%, $5.41. As you saw, our earnings and EPS benefited modestly from two onetime items that partially offset each other. Adjusting for these, they were up 18.6% and nearly 21%, $5.33. Again, our P&C underwriting income was up over 15% to $1.4 billion, driven by strong earned premium growth and great underwriting margins. The ex-CAT current accident year combined ratio was 83.7%. On the investment side, adjusted net investment income of nearly $1.5 billion was up 23.5%. We now have more than $140 billion in invested assets, up over 19% in the last two years. And our fixed income portfolio yield is 4.9% versus 4.4% a year ago. Our reinvestment rate is currently averaging 6.1%. Our liquidity is very strong, and investment income will continue to grow well as we reinvest cash flows at higher rates. Life segment income of $268 million was up 9.8%. Our annualized core operating ROE was 13.7%, with a return on tangible equity of nearly 22%. Peter will have some more to say about financial items. Turning to growth, pricing, and the rate environment. Consolidated net premiums for the company increased over 14%. For Global P&C, which excludes agriculture, net premiums increased 13.3% in the quarter with commercial up over 11% and consumer up over 19%. P&C premium growth in the quarter again was balanced broad-based globally between areas of the globe and commercial versus consumer, reflecting favorable underwriting and market conditions overall. Life insurance premiums and deposits were up over 39%, driven by our business in Asia and came from a number of countries and distribution channels. Huatai contributed 2.9% and 20.6 percentage points, respectively, to the global P&C and life growth results. In terms of the commercial P&C rate environment, overall conditions were quite favorable in both property and casualty, and price increases exceeded loss cost while rate decreases in financial lines slowed. Starting with North America, premiums, excluding agriculture, were up over 10%, consisting of 12.3% growth in personal insurance and about 9.5% growth in commercial. P&C lines up 13% and financial lines down about 7.5%. If we adjust the P&C growth to the net impact from two items in the major accounts division, P&C lines normalized growth was a very strong 11.6%. These two items were an unusually large structured transaction we wrote partially offset by the previously discussed corrective underwriting actions in primary and excess casualty that are continuing to wind down over the next few quarters. By the way, that large structured transaction negatively impacted North America commercial's combined ratio by over 0.5 points, the loss ratio impacted by over 1 point. Excluding this impact unmasks the current accident year combined ratio run rate. Supporting North America P&C growth was record new business of over $1.2 billion at a very strong renewal retention on a policy count basis of 84.7%. Both speak to the tone of the market and our excellent operating performance. Premiums in our major accounts and specialty division increased 12% with our large account retail business up 12% and our E&S business up about 10.5%. Premiums in our middle market division increased about 7% with P&C lines up 10.6% and financial lines down 6.5%. Again, the P&C market environment in North America overall is quite favorable and rational, financial lines aside. Pricing increased 12.8% including rate of 9.4%, an exposure change that acts like rate of 3.1%. From our very large middle market business to small commercial to personal lines, and driven by both property and casualty, we saw the best rates in pricing overall that we've seen in the last four to five quarters. It was one of the best quarters for large casualty pricing. In our North America business, rate increases for property and casualty exceeded loss cost trends, let alone pricing, which was even stronger. Let me provide a bit more color around rates and pricing. Property pricing was up 13%, with rates up 7.8% and exposure change of 4.8%. Casualty pricing in North America was up 13.1% with rates up 10.9% and exposure up 2%. And in workers' comp, which includes both primary comp and large account risk management, pricing was up 4.8% with rates up 0.2% and exposure up 4.6%. Loss costs in North America are relatively stable and in line with what we contemplate in our loss specs. We are trending loss costs at 6.8%, short-tail classes at 5.3% and long tail, excluding comp at 7.6%, trending our first dollar workers' comp book at 4.6%. For financial lines, the underwriting environment and a number of classes in a word is simply poor. Rates continue to decline, albeit at a slower pace. We are, of course, trading growth for underwriting margin and income where we need to. In the quarter, rates and pricing for North America financial lines in aggregate were down 3% and 2.7%, respectively. We are trending financial lines loss costs at just over 5%. On the consumer side of North America, our high net worth personal lines business had another outstanding quarter. This is a powerhouse business, over $5.5 billion in premium last year and it grew over 12% in the quarter with new business growth of nearly 35%. It speaks to a franchise and a class of its own in terms of service and capability. Premium growth for our true high net worth Premier and Signature segments, the group that demands the most underwriting and servicing, grew 16.5%. In our homeowners business, we achieved pricing of 17% in the quarter, while our selected loss cost trend remained steady at 10.5%. While a small quarter, our agriculture business had a very good underwriting result as the '23 crop year turned out a bit better than we projected. Turning to our international general insurance operations. Net premiums were up 17.5% or 16.7% in constant dollars. Our international commercial business grew 11.4%, while our consumer was up over 26%. Growth this quarter was geographically diverse with all major regions contributing, which again illustrates the true global nature of the company. Asia led the way with premiums up 40%. Excluding Huatai's contribution, premiums were up 7.7%. Latin America had a strong quarter, with premiums up about 13%, while the continent of Europe grew 10.3%. We continue to achieve positive breakthrough exposure across our international commercial portfolio. Retail property and casualty lines pricing, up 5.5% and financial lines pricing, down 2.3 million. Loss cost inflation across our international retail commercial portfolio is trending at 5.8%, with P&C lines trending 6.1% and financial lines trending 4.8%. Within our international consumer P&C business, our Personal Lines division had an exceptional quarter with constant dollar growth of 47%, led by Asia and Latin America. By the way, the modest increase in Overseas General's ex-CAT current accident year combined ratio this quarter was primarily due to the consolidation of our China business. In our international life insurance business, which is overwhelmingly Asia, premium and deposits were up over 50% in constant dollars, with strong contributions from Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, and Korea. Excluding Huatai Life, premiums and deposits were up over 10%. Depending on the country, growth was driven by tied agency, brokerage, and direct marketing distribution channels. Lastly, Global Re had a strong quarter with premium growth of almost 30% and a combined ratio of 76.9%. We allocate incrementally more CAT capacity to our reinsurance business and grew both our CAT excess and risk property portfolios, in particular, this quarter. In summary, we had an excellent quarter and start to the year. We remain well positioned to continue producing outstanding results through the balance of the year and beyond. We remain confident in our ability to continue growing operating earnings at a rapid pace through P&C revenue growth and underwriting margins, investment income, and life. Now I'm going to turn it over to Peter, and then we're going to come back, and we're going to take your questions.

Peter Enns, Chief Financial Officer

Thank you, Evan. As you just heard, we are building on the momentum from our record 2023 year with strong growth in revenue and earnings per share this quarter. We are effectively managing our balance sheet and finished the quarter in a robust financial position, with book value exceeding $60 billion in cash and invested assets totaling $143 billion, each surpassing last quarter's all-time highs. Adjusted operating cash flow reached $3.6 billion. There were two one-time earnings items this quarter that I want to highlight. First, we realized an incremental $55 million deferred tax benefit related to the new 2023 Bermuda corporate income tax law. This resulted from finalizing our review of two smaller subsidiaries since last quarter, and we do not expect further deferred tax gains related to this law in the future. Second, we made a contribution of $30 million pretax, or $24 million after tax, to the Chubb Foundation. These items provided a net benefit of $0.08 per share. Additionally, there were two other significant items this quarter. In March, we issued $1 billion of 10-year debt to retire existing debt due to mature in May 2024. Finally, we acquired an additional 9% of shares in Huatai, increasing our ownership interest to 85.5%, leaving less than 1% of outstanding Huatai shares to close. During the quarter, book and tangible book value per share, excluding AOCI, grew by 2.2% and 2.9%, respectively, from December 31, driven by strong operating results, partially offset by $350 million in dividends and $316 million in share repurchases during the quarter. Turning to investments. Our A-rated portfolio produced adjusted net investment income of $1.48 billion, slightly beating our guidance of $1.45 billion. We expect our adjusted net investment income to have a run rate of approximately $1.5 billion to $1.52 billion next quarter and to go up from there. Turning to underwriting results. The quarter included pretax catastrophe losses of $435 million, which is modestly lower relative to the prior year and is principally from winter storms and other weather-related events in the U.S. Prior period development in the quarter in our active companies was a positive $216 million pretax with favorable development of $311 million in short tail lines, primarily from property and credit-related lines, and $95 million of unfavorable development in long tail lines, which was primarily from excess casualty and was within our range of expectations. Our corporate runoff portfolio had unfavorable development of $9 million pretax. Our paid-to-incurred ratio for the quarter was 84%. Our reported core effective tax rate was 15.2% or 17.3% for the quarter, excluding the update to our Bermuda tax benefit. As I've said before, our first quarter tax rate also tends to be the lowest of the year, due to certain tax benefits associated with equity award vesting and stock option exercises. We continue to expect our annual core operating effective tax rate for the full year to be in the range of 18.75% to 19.25%. I'll now turn the call back over to Karen.

Karen Beyer, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Thank you. At this point, we're happy to take the questions.

David Motemaden, Analyst

First question. Evan, I just wanted to maybe get a little bit more detail on the $95 million of unfavorable reserve development on the long tail lines that you guys took this quarter? And maybe just unpack that a little bit more would be helpful.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes. We recognized over $200 million in reserve releases, which provides some perspective. This included $95 million in adverse development related to long tail lines in North America commercial business. The impact was not limited to a specific time frame, as it spanned from 2016 onward. Most of this was associated with large account excess casualty and auto-related sectors we've previously discussed, particularly in trucking and logistics companies with significant commercial fleets. We have been actively addressing this through rate adjustments and underwriting actions, including retentions. Our loss projections reflect these measures. Notably, we had an unusually large loss portfolio transfer, which we managed to a degree through our underwriting strategies, which you heard about in the last quarter. We anticipate this could extend for two more quarters, all connected to the same business dynamics. It's important to note that this development was not unexpected, as we continuously track actual activity against our expectations for all product lines. We had been observing higher-than-anticipated loss activity for this sector, which led us to conduct a more in-depth analysis this quarter. As we always do, we took the negative news into account and are cautious about recognizing positive developments. As mentioned last quarter, our reserves are quite robust.

David Motemaden, Analyst

Got it. That's helpful. I noticed that the growth in commercial casualty net premiums written accelerated during the quarter, and you mentioned that the rate increases also picked up a bit in commercial casualty. Can you discuss how you are balancing the heightened uncertainty in the environment while still pursuing growth, which seems to be your current approach?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

The growth is significant. It was not marginal; it represented a major shift in our rate, which exceeded loss costs and included changes in exposure. This factor greatly contributed to our growth. We also increased our exposure, especially in our middle market long-tail business, and there was notable growth in specific lines within large accounts as well. The majority of our portfolio is adequately priced in casualty, and we are achieving rates that reflect the loss cost trend, maintaining that adequacy. In specific stressed classes that require rate adjustments to meet our target combined ratios, we've seen a market acceleration in rates. As the market responds, we are able to grow the business to some extent. In certain classes, this dynamic is indeed taking place.

Michael Zaremski, Analyst

Regarding social inflation, I believe the primary approach to address it involves risk selection and pricing. However, I remember you mentioned in your shareholder letter, Evan, that there’s a more focused effort on lobbying or exploring state-by-state reforms. I'm interested to hear if there have been any updates from Chubb or the industry on strategies to tackle this issue from a systemic perspective.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes. First of all, our loss picks reflect the reality of the environment, the inflation we observe. And that includes any actions as we know them to be that might ameliorate it around tort reform. Tort reform is going to be a long-term never-ending process. As you say, it's not going to be federal. State by state, it could be county by county, depending. And it depends on the class of business as to the kind of reform that's required to bend that curve and loss cost. The insurance industry can support tort reform and does. The insurance industry can't particularly lead it. We don't have the printing press. This is ultimately paid for by corporate America, and it's paid for by consumers, by the products and the services from corporate America, it's a tax on everybody. If you look at it in a clear-eyed way, we reflect the inflation that we see, whether it comes from social inflation, so-called social inflation, or other causes in the prices and the rates we ultimately charge corporate America to the business. Tort reform comes and there's litigation finance where disclosure laws have to change around that and I mentioned that better. And some states require it, most don't. And it's very simple because it puts in context how sympathetic is the plaintiff. And what are the motives? There's laws around who bears liability, the responsibility, what they call joint and several laws around it. You could be 1% liable, but you're the only one with any money, so they make you 100% responsible financially. There are reasons that this occurs, but that is also being gamed by the trial bar in how they target cases and how they target companies. It's those sorts of things. The insurance industry is hardly sympathetic. Corporate America needs to do more in this case, and we are all active. A number of companies are active in advocating for reforms, but it's not a magic, it's no silver magic bullet. It's going to take many years and it's going to require more effort than is currently being expended.

Michael Zaremski, Analyst

Great. Switching topics, I have a quick question about Personal Lines. From what Chubb has mentioned regarding loss cost inflation in personal lines, I understand you have a different portfolio compared to your peers. However, you have been discussing close to double-digit loss cost inflation for several years now. It seems that some of your competitors are finally acknowledging this, having previously underestimated it. Can you provide any insights on whether the loss cost inflation is primarily due to weather factors, wage increases, or a combination of both? Additionally, any details on the 10% to 10.5% loss inflation would be appreciated.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes, it originates from a few sources. It stems from the frequency of loss and various risks, including weather-related and water-related factors, as well as the impact on housing infrastructure. Additionally, wage inflation and material costs also contribute. We don't insure the average homeowner; rather, we focus on those who are more affluent. Our product is designed to provide comprehensive coverage that effectively restores what you had prior to the loss, not just a similar version. This approach inherently includes some level of inflation. We also insure more complex properties and valuable content, which may lead to a higher degree of inflation compared to general trends. However, we actively monitor and manage this through appropriate pricing and sufficient coverage for our clients. This means our homeowners will see this reflected in the annual bill they receive from us.

Gregory Peters, Analyst

When I was looking through your results, I was particularly struck by the growth in the reinsurance lines, seems to have accelerated. And I'm just curious if there is a change in your perspective regarding leading into those market conditions.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes, Greg, it's important to remember that percentages can be misleading. Our business isn't very large, and we're not a major reinsurer. So while the percentage growth looks impressive, it comes from a relatively small base. In monetary terms, it's encouraging, and I appreciate our Global Re colleagues, but the total amount isn't substantial. We allocated more CAT capacity with Global Re due to the pricing environment and the structure of the cedents' portfolios. This means they are taking on more CAT excess and a bit more property proportional and excess per risk, primarily in areas where they see favorable conditions, largely influenced by the CAT results.

Gregory Peters, Analyst

Okay. Fair enough. I have to ask this question knowing that I might not get a great answer, but I believe it's appropriate to bring it up.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

You can ask anyway, and you'll get a lousy answer, go ahead.

Gregory Peters, Analyst

Well, the topic is M&A. You highlighted it by mentioning the drag of 1 to 2 points from holding excess capital in your shareholder letter. You're producing excellent results, and I believe this could be a time for you to become more active in the market. Could you discuss your overall perspective on what you're observing in the market? Is there a pipeline available? Are there many opportunities out there? Please share your insights if you can.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Greg, I'm feeling confident. The results are excellent. We have surplus capital for both risk and opportunities. It's currently earning over 6%. Allocating this capital to our invested assets certainly requires a strong return on equity. The cash we hold enhances shareholder returns. We're a global company with numerous opportunities, and we remain alert to them. However, as I mentioned, I'm feeling confident. Don't hold your breath.

Ryan Tunis, Analyst

I guess first question, just on financial lines. I think you said that it's quite frankly, dumb. Now, that's obviously like a pretty broad set of various lines within financials. I think I heard you say that you're shrinking in mid-market, too. And my perception is that, it was a little bit more disciplined than some of the major accounts. So just curious if you could just take us within financial lines, whether it's account size or D&O excess whatever, like where are folks acting more or less irrationally?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes, the situation is that in major accounts and middle market, the behavior varies, especially where competition becomes irrational. We have publicly traded D&O, and there are instances in both middle market and large accounts where foolish decisions are evident, particularly in large accounts and publicly traded deals. There's also not-for-profit D&O written across both major and middle markets, as well as in E&S. We understand the market well since we are the largest writers in this sector and can identify the real risks and where losses originate. In terms of employment practices liability, there are many who are unaware of the trends and risks that are driving EPLI, including legislative changes that affect various states. It's not just about wage and hour issues; technology is also a factor, and there are many who are unprepared for these shifts. Additionally, changes at the federal level are impacting financial lines, and these trends are evident and forthcoming. The positive aspect is that claims made processes reveal their issues quickly, and we have numerous opportunities in various markets. However, in some cases, we're not going to follow the crowd blindly.

Ryan Tunis, Analyst

I understand. As a follow-up, I’d like to shift the focus to the priorities within U.S. personal lines. It seems that a few years ago, you were more active in California, but recently there seems to be a stronger emphasis on risk selection and growth, which is understandable. Currently, it appears that you have more than $1 billion in underwriting earnings, which seems slightly underwritten. Could you provide an update on the key priorities for managing that business at this time?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

We have a clear sense of priorities. On one side, we want to innovate continuously and we are eager to do so. We focus on how we define our services and coverage that customers expect from a top-tier carrier, which includes offering resilient and engineering services along with using technology to enhance the customer experience. We aim to employ technology in claims to manage better and more seamless outcomes. Our clients are exposed to catastrophic events, and they willingly choose to reside in areas with such risks. They are open to sharing some of that risk with us, and we can help them manage the risks they assume while also reducing the potential losses on the risks we take. This strategy also enables us to create more capacity for catastrophic events, which is essential for us to handle more exposure. With a finite balance sheet, we must be mindful of the risks we take. Our pricing continues to improve regarding exposure to different perils, and we aim to enhance our risk rating to apply more precise rates and prices to various risk groups. We are committed to maintaining this momentum but strive to improve even further. This approach allows us to offer more coverage, particularly in areas like flood, where we are proactively providing more protection to clients while effectively managing the portfolio.

Brian Meredith, Analyst

Evan, just curious, and I'm sure there's some moving parts here, but can you help me kind of square in North America commercial. I'm looking at gross written premiums up a little below 2% and then nets up 9.5%. And have seen your ceded premiums kind of continue to drop the last couple of quarters, is there something going on there? Is it technical? Are you buying less reinsurance? What's going on?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Yes. I'm going to let John Lupica explain this. It really stemmed from two factors this quarter, and I forgot how the LPT impacted it, but it distorted the gross figures.

John Lupica, Executive Vice Chairman

Yes, Brian, as Evan had noted, we had in that large structured transaction this quarter that produced net written premium with no gross written premium. In addition, we had exited two large MGAs or fronted programs that historically pursued a lot of gross with very little net. When you adjust for those three items, the gross and net are virtually identical. That's really...

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

It's really transactional, not fundamental.

Brian Meredith, Analyst

Got you. No change in reinsurance by now, that makes sense. Okay. Excellent. And then, Evan, I may have missed this, but you provided a lot of great kind of pricing rate and trend exposure commentary. But did you give us what the kind of total North America commercial pricing, call it, rate and trend was? And if not, could we get that, you typically provided it?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

I provided the information already. Are you asking me to repeat it? Do you want me to refer back to my notes? Regarding North America, I mentioned that pricing increased by 12.8%, which includes a rate of 9.4% and an exposure change of 3.1%.

Brian Meredith, Analyst

Got you. And trend?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

We're observing a loss cost trend of 6.8% overall, with short-tail at 5.3% and long tail at 7.6%. Yes, this is a comprehensive report.

Jian Huang, Analyst

Hopefully, I'm not asking anyone to repeat anything. But just a quick question on your annual shareholder letter, right? You talked about the willingness to pull back on unprofitable lines a demonstration of underwriting discipline, which is kind of really curious as to how to square away that line of thinking with your first quarter results because it seems like the first quarter results continue to demonstrate a lot of strength, a lot of growth. Is the financial line somewhere you're looking at as a...

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Hey, you're not listening. Did you see that? I'm going to interrupt you. Are you really looking at the financial line? First, I mentioned upfront that in major accounts in certain areas of casualty, we are taking action. We observed that last quarter and this quarter, and it affects growth. There are also other areas experiencing growth. Those are two that are noticeable. By the way, look at our 20-year track record. Over any period of time, we have shrunk our business, cut businesses in half over periods of time when we couldn't earn an underwriting profit and then triple the math to that. Do you have another question for me?

Robert Cox, Analyst

A high-level question. So Chubb produced an 86% combined ratio, which has continued to improve and net investment income contributions to ROEs have gone up. I know there's more bifurcation than ever with respect to pricing adequacy by line of business. But I'm curious when do you think the market will sort of dictate the matching of rate and loss trend versus the excess margin you're generating now?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

I'm not sure I understand your question. Sorry.

Robert Cox, Analyst

So I'm curious when you think the rate and loss trend will be at similar levels compared to when the rate exceeds the loss trend.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

I have no idea. It depends on when the market responds, and that may never really happen. I see that you are asking in a very theoretical way. A market is inherently messy, but typically, when the rate and price are adequate or exceed what is needed for a reasonable return, the market eventually notices and becomes more competitive. At that point, the rate and price stabilize with loss cost, and the market starts to soften. When that part of the cycle occurs, it means that the rate on price is less than the loss cost. This situation is not necessarily bad until the rate and price relative to loss cost fail to generate a reasonable return on capital. And maybe just a follow up on that. Curious if you think that with data and analytics, these cycles are becoming less volatile over time. In some areas, yes. Some areas, absolutely not. Because the loss cost environment, which data and analytics cannot predict is not less volatile. When the loss cost environment is more specific i.e., loss cost inflation, then with data and analytics in steady periods like that, then the amplitude of cycles is different.

Jimmy Bhullar, Analyst

I had a question on just your comments on dumb behavior and financial lines. I was wondering if you could talk about who it is that you're seeing being undisciplined. Is it companies that are established, that are large peers in the market? Or smaller competitors, new money that's come in, just some color on who's driving because it's been going on for a while, so.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Next question, Jimmy.

Jamminder Bhullar, Analyst

Not going to comment? All right. There has been considerable discussion regarding cash, especially in relation to pre- and post-COVID scenarios. Some companies have experienced negative outcomes since COVID. Can you share your perspective on casualty reserves in general for the industry and specifically for your organization?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

We did expect a change of loss cost pattern frequency in particular. And we have talked about it during COVID that we didn't take the head fakes that loss costs during shutdown, obviously, courts are closed, frequency plummets and as does severity. And at that time, we maintained our view. We saw right through it and said, trends aren't changing, so we continue to trend. It's just a question of reporting on what period does it get reported in? So we expected that the trend doesn't change, but the reporting pattern changes. So therefore, if you really want to look at it in a correct way, you'd say, it went down during COVID to reaccelerate after COVID and then the expected cohorts of claims in aggregate still appear, and that's what we've seen. The pattern post-COVID is not out of line with our expectations in our pricing and loss picks.

Peter Enns, Chief Financial Officer

For next year and after, it's just too early to say. There's too many moving parts in terms of how the different countries are going to adopt and we're looking at it closely, but it's just too early to say.

Cave Montazeri, Analyst

There was nothing called out this quarter with regards to the Baltimore bridge losses? I appreciate it's early days, but is there any color worth sharing with us on this topic?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Our policy is to not report on individual claims, but I've seen a lot of discussion about this. It's a tragedy that accidents like this happen, and they cause significant damage. However, regarding Chubb, it's just another large loss. While we do have some exposure, it falls within what we expect and is not unusually large for us. So, it's simply another unfortunate claim, and that's all there is to it.

Elyse Greenspan, Analyst

My first question, Evan, I was hoping you could just provide some more color on what drove the sequential acceleration in exposure growth that you pointed to within Property Casualty as well as within workers' comp?

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

Well, what I said, Elyse, thank you, is the premium growth because we don't really disclose exposure, but the premium growth came from, a substantial portion of it came from rate and price, which were very healthy across the portfolio. Property grew nicely. Property was our biggest growth area. Casualty grew, particularly in our middle market area and E&S. And rate and price had a substantial contribution to the growth, though we also grew new business where pricing versus loss cost is healthy to us.

Elyse Greenspan, Analyst

And then my follow-up, you highlighted some planned reunderwriting within North America commercial. I believe you had also told us about that last quarter, and it sounds like we'll have that work through for the next couple of quarters. So is it the right way to think about, I guess, the growth in North America commercial ex the LPT and just the reunderwriting as kind of the baseline of growth for the year. I know you don't like to guide, but you seem pretty positive about just casualty pricing and things like that, just trying to pull it all together.

Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and CEO

I'm not going to help you with your worksheet, I'm sorry, Elyse. We don't provide guidance on growth for the year. What I can tell you is that if we exclude the unusual size of the LPT and the one-time underwriting action in large accounts that I mentioned, we provided a growth rate which represents the underlying growth rate for that quarter. However, we didn't indicate that this serves as a run rate for the year. This is a diversified commercial and personal property casualty book of business. We do not give growth guidance for the year.

Karen Beyer, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Thanks, everyone, for joining us today. If you have any follow-up questions, we'll be around to take your call. Enjoy the day. Thank you.

Operator, Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining, and you may now disconnect your lines.