AGM Statement

RNS Number : 8702J

Randall & Quilter Inv Hldgs Ltd

18 June 2014

 



Randall & Quilter Investment Holdings Ltd

AGM Statement

18 June 2014

Randall & Quilter Investment Holdings Ltd. (AIM:RQIH), the specialist non-life insurance investor, service provider and underwriting manager, is holding its Annual General Meeting today at 12.00 p.m. In his address, Chairman and CEO Ken Randall, will update shareholders as follows:

"Since announcing our final results on April 22, 2014, I am pleased to confirm that the business continues to trade satisfactorily and we expect the 2014 full year result to be in line with market expectations. As indicated as early as the trading update on February 28, 2014, we expect substantially all, or, the entire profit, subject to the ability to close certain run-off transactions by June 30, to emerge in the latter part of the year. This is due to the second half weighting of many of our service businesses, the payment of annual bonuses in the first half of the year and the timing of the annual actuarial reviews which tend to produce net reserve savings at the end of the year.

The Insurance Investments Division ('IID') looks set to have a satisfactory first half with higher than anticipated investment income and results in line with expectations from the owned insurance companies and syndicate participations, despite continuing slow premium growth.  

The Insurance Services Division is performing to budget with strong results in the UK broking activities outweighing some delays in new business income generation in the US.

The Underwriting Management Division performance is broadly in line but the full year result remains largely dependent on the ability to generate new third party business in the second half of the year. We continue to look actively at ways to enhance delivery of our strategy of accessing niche business and generating related fee income and look forward to announcing developments in this area in due course. As commented on in the final 2013 results and widely reported in the industry, underwriting conditions remain challenging which has a small impact on commission income from our MGAs. We are however pleased that income levels have largely held up in recent months.  The classes of business targeted by Syndicate 1991 have similarly suffered from challenging market conditions but we are confident that our singular business model will continue to help identify and develop profitable opportunities in our target markets.

Our acquisition pipeline continues to be strong and as commented on above, we are pursuing a number of attractive opportunities, some of which we hope to complete in the near term. There is an excellent pipeline for the second half of the year, including deals of a larger scale than those recently announced. Our track record in providing captive exit solutions and our recent structural optimization, including the launch of R&Q Malta are clear factors behind our increased deal flow, as is the impending introduction of Solvency II. 

In summary, we look forward to the future with confidence.  Our legacy and servicing pipelines continue to offer prospects for profitable development. We have a strongly growing presence in the market for legacy insurance assets but the exact timing of such acquisitions is by nature, difficult to predict. While our live underwriting platform is still gaining scale, we remain confident that the overall strategy will deliver strong, sustainable growth in the future."

-Ends-

Enquiries to:

Randall & Quilter Investment Holdings Ltd.	www.rqih.com
Tom Booth	Tel: [phone]
Numis Securities Limited
Stuart Skinner/Robert Bruce (Nominated Adviser)	Tel: [phone]
Charles Farquhar (Broker)	Tel: [phone]
Shore Capital Stockbrokers Limited
Dru Danford / Stephane Auton	Tel: [phone]
FTI Consulting
Edward Berry/Tom Blackwell	Tel: [phone]

Notes to Editors:

About R&Q

Randall & Quilter pursues a buy and build strategy and has created a comprehensive range of investment activities and services in the global non-life insurance market.

R&Q is focused on the following three core areas:

·      Insurance Investments

·      Insurance Services

·      Underwriting Management

The Group:

·      provides a range of services to both the live and legacy (re)insurance markets to support growing businesses and address complex and challenging run-off issues;

·      has a team of over 350 insurance professionals based in the UK, US, Bermuda, and Europe with wide service capability in both the 'live' and 'run-off' markets;

·      owns and manages a portfolio of insurance companies, both active and in run-off, in the UK, US and Europe with net assets of £116m as at 31 December 2013;

·      owns a Bermuda Class 3A insurance company which currently supports the Group's syndicate participations;

·      launched Syndicate 1991 which commenced underwriting from January 1, 2013 with a capacity of £150m for 2014, manages one RITC ('run-off') syndicate, 3330, and owns and operates 3 MGA business units;

·      acquires and manages a portfolio of insurance receivables, with a carrying cost of £16m as at 31 December 2013.

The Group was founded by Ken Randall and Alan Quilter in 1991.

Website: www.rqih.com

 

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