Ryan’s property employees are producing 11% more quotes
Ryan Specialty held its second-quarter 2026 earnings call on July 30. Here are the key takeaways.
Property quotes per employee increased 11%
Employees across Ryan Specialty Underwriting Managers’ property business produced 11% more quotes per person during the past 12 months. The measure includes all property employees, not only underwriters, and reflects the company’s investments in automating data extraction, structuring, enrichment and rating preparation.
“So the average RSUM on property employees, and this is property employees, not just the underwriters, achieved 11% more quotes per head in the last 12 months than the prior year.”
Ryan sees proprietary data—not AI access—as its advantage
Ryan is building a proprietary engine to deploy AI within its own controls and train it on internal data. Management believes access to AI models will become widely available, leaving industry data and expertise as the real differentiators.
“As AI becomes a commodity that anyone can rent, our advantage is the proprietary data and hard-won expertise built into our platform that cannot be easily replicated.”
AI is helping Ryan audit five times as many underwriting files
Ryan is using AI to expand its underwriting oversight and better identify which files require review. The company said it now audits five times as many files as it did a year ago.
“With both investment and augmentation of AI, we’re auditing 5x as many files as we did last year, and we’re increasing the probability of getting to the right files within that subset.”
Ryan can now prepare facultative reinsurance submissions in minutes
Its reinsurance facultative workbench turns submissions into priced, decision-ready files in minutes rather than days. Ryan is extending the technology to treaty reinsurance, where it can analyze years of submissions and claims.
“Our reinsurance FAC workbench now turns a submission into a priced decision-ready file in minutes, not days.”
Property catastrophe prices fell as much as 35%
Ryan faced significant pricing pressure in catastrophe-exposed property as new capacity entered the market. Despite prices falling between 25% and 35% on parts of the book, high retention and new-business wins limited the decline in property revenue.
“While the prices on the CAT book were down as much as 25% or 35%, we were hanging on to the business, and again, winning new business.”
Property competition is happening inside E&S
Ryan does not see large amounts of business returning to the admitted market. Instead, additional surplus-lines carriers and capacity are competing against one another for business already in the E&S channel.
“It’s not going to the admitted market, it’s inter-E&S competition that’s driving the price.”
New E&S capacity is also an opportunity
Although additional capital contributes to lower pricing, new E&S carriers can become clients of Ryan’s wholesale brokerage and delegated underwriting businesses. Some use Ryan Specialty Underwriting Managers for access to specialty underwriting capabilities.
“The capital is real, the rate pressure is real, but it’s a net positive opportunity set for — across Ryan Specialty.”
Ryan doesn’t expect E&S to surrender its market share
The company estimates the non-admitted market now represents 24% to 25% of the broader commercial insurance market. Management believes structural changes—including admitted insurers owning surplus-lines subsidiaries—will prevent the E&S market from shrinking as it did during earlier cycles.
“We don’t expect the market to recede and to soften like it has in cycles gone by.”
Construction projects are lumpy—but Ryan views the revenue as recurring
Ryan benefited from several large construction and data-center placements in June. The timing of individual projects is difficult to predict, but management considers the business recurring because new projects continue to come from the same retail brokerage relationships.
“We consider these construction projects recurring income. They happen to be different risks. They recur from the same source.”
Ryan Re is approaching $2 billion in premium
Ryan has expanded its delegated underwriting platform beyond traditional MGAs and MGUs into reinsurance underwriting, alternative capital and employee benefits. Ryan Re is expected to place approximately $2 billion in reinsurance premium during 2026.
“We’ve built Ryan Re, our reinsurance managing underwriter, and are on track to place $2 billion in reinsurance premium this year.”
New businesses were designed for a softer P&C market
Ryan developed reinsurance underwriting, alternative risk and benefits capabilities to reduce its dependence on the P&C pricing cycle. These businesses remain smaller than wholesale brokerage and underwriting management but are becoming meaningful contributors to growth and earnings.
“They were all designed to balance our firm against the inevitable softening of the P&C market.”
Ryan is unlikely to make a meaningful acquisition this year
The company continues to evaluate acquisitions but does not expect to close a significant transaction in 2026. Its current pipeline points toward 2027.
“Based on the opportunities that we are seeing in the market, we believe it is unlikely that we will close a meaningful acquisition in 2026. Rather, we are looking towards 2027.”
Share repurchases are absorbing capital in the meantime
Ryan repurchased 8.1 million shares for $260 million during the second quarter and another $42 million in July. It also increased its repurchase authorization by $300 million.
Ryan’s Lloyd’s consortium will assume a 15% share
Ryan Specialty Underwriting Managers launched its own Lloyd’s consortium stamp. Beginning August 1, the consortium will take a 15% share of RSUM’s syndicated business, giving Ryan another source of aligned underwriting capital.
Recent hiring is helping growth but weighing on margins
Ryan’s large 2025 hiring class has contributed to organic growth from the beginning, but the expense of those hires continues to pressure margins. The company expects the producers and underwriters to become increasingly productive in 2027 and beyond.
“The talent that we acquired last year, that for us from a margin perspective has been a headwind, but it has been accretive to our organic growth from day one.”
