Progressive September, Q3 Profits Rise On Higher Gains

(RTTNews) - Auto insurance group Progressive Corp. (PGR) reported Thursday a profit for the third quarter that grew 27 percent from last year, reflecting higher net realized gains on securities.

Profit for the month of September also surged 49 percent from last year, reflecting a significant increase in net realized gains on securities.

The Mayfield Village, Ohio-based company reported net income of $296.1 million or $0.50 per share for the third quarter, higher than $232.4 million or $0.39 per share in the prior-year quarter. The results for the latest quarter include pretax net realized gains on securities of $38.2 million, up 30 percent from $27.9 million a year ago.

On average, 21 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to report earnings of $0.44 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Net premiums written for the quarter grew 6 percent from the year-ago period to $4.73 billion, and net premiums earned also rose 6 percent to $4.54 billion from last year. eleven Wall Street analysts were looking for revenue estimates of $4.70 billion for the quarter.

Combined ratio for the quarter declined 1.7 percentage points from the year-ago quarter to 92.5 percent.

For the month of September, Progressive posted net income of $92 million or $0.16 per share, up about 50 percent from $61.8 million or $0.10 per share in the same period last year.

Pretax net realized gains on securities for the month were $20.4 million, sharply higher than a mere $0.2 million in the prior-year period.

Total revenues for September were $1.48 billion. Net premiums written increased 5 percent to $1.42 billion, and net premiums earned grew 6 percent to $1.40 billion from the prior-ago period.

Combined ratio for September decreased 1.6 percentage points from the year-ago period to 93.3 percent.

For September, the company's total personal lines policies in force increased 2 percent to 13.32 million. Of this, total personal auto policies grew 2 percent to 9.24 million, with agency auto policies declining 1 percent, while direct auto policies grew 7 percent. Total special lines policies for the month grew 1 percent from last year to 4.08 million.

However, total commercial auto policies in the month declined 1 percent from last year to 517,800.

In Friday's regular trading session, PGR is currently trading at $25.30, up $0.03 or 0.12% on a volume of 0.45 million shares. In the past 52-week period, the stock has been trading in a range of $22.53 to $28.54.