Amerisafe adds new chief sales officer

Amerisafe hosted its Q2’23 earnings call on Jul 28th, 2023. Select highlights:

• The workers’ compensation market remains profitable despite rate softening.
• Amerisafe is a disciplined underwriter in this high-hazard market, consistently maintaining strong margins.
• In Q2, reported an 85.4% combined ratio and an 18.6% return on average equity.
• Top line decreased 3.7% due to rate declines and slightly slower wage inflation compared to the strong growth in Q2’22.
  • Starting in Q3’22, experienced double-digit payroll growth, mostly due to wage increases. In the last few quarters, wage growth has been averaging around 8%, excluding new employees. In the current quarter, wage growth was closer to 5%, aligning with the national average of around 5.5%.
  • Construction is the largest part of its business, and while wage growth has slowed a bit, it remains healthy. According to BLS and Bureau of Economic Analysis data, construction spending and the labor market are still positive, and layoffs have decreased in recent data points.
  • Averaging somewhere around 2% for new employees – not really seeing additional workforce.
• Retention for policies at renewal remains strong at 93%, despite competition.
• Losses are well-managed with a steady 71% current accident year loss ratio.
• Expect market dynamics to remain challenging, but its experience positions it well to retain policyholders and attract new business.
• Recognized as a top-performing company for the 15th consecutive year.
• Re claims –
  • Amerisafe is focused on closing claims.
  • Despite claim counts starting to rise, this quarter has 56 fewer reported claims than the second quarter of last year.
  • Open inventory has decreased by 275 claims compared to the second quarter of last year and over 100 fewer than year-end, despite adding reported claims.
• Welcomed Ray Wise to Amerisafe as Chief Sales Officer. One of the goals is for the insurer to be more efficient and more effective with Amerisafe’s agent force “He has more than 30 years of experience in the industry. His background of driving results through customer experience fits well with Amerisafe model and will play an integral role.”