Australia's QBE tops profit forecast, lifts dividend; shares jump

Adds further details throughout, analyst comment in paragraph 10

By Sneha Kumar

Feb 20 (Reuters) - Australia's QBE Insurance Group's QBE.AX full-year profit outpaced expectations on Friday, helped by lower catastrophe claims and higher investment income, pushing its shares to their biggest one-day jump in more than 10 months.

Shares rose as much as 8.5% to A$21.76 in their strongest trading session since April 10, 2025 as of 0024 GMT. The stock climbed to its highest level in more than five months and was among the top performers on the ASX 200 benchmark <.AXJO>, which was last down 0.3%.

For the year ended December 31, net catastrophe claims eased to $751 million, comfortably within the company's allowance and below last year's $1.05 billion.

Annual net investment income also rose to $1.63 billion from $1.49 billion last year.

Together, these tailwinds helped lift the insurer's annual adjusted net cash profit after income tax about 23% to $2.13 billion, ahead of the Visible Alpha consensus estimate of $2.06 billion and $1.73 billion logged a year earlier.

"This is a strong result from QBE, with both reported COR and GWP growth better than market expectations, while investment earnings were also higher than expected," Citi wrote.

The group — which operates in 27 countries, including the United States — said its annual gross written premiums (GWP) increased 7% to $23.96 billion, while the combined operating ratio $(COR)$ improved to 91.9% from 93.1% in the prior year.

A ratio below 100% means the insurer earned more in premiums than it paid out in claims, commissions, and other expenses.

Looking ahead in 2026, the insurer expects to log mid-single-digit constant-currency growth in gross written premiums and a combined operating ratio of around 92.5%.

Jarden analysts said that the GWP growth target could be "challenging in the face of falling rate", and suggested that management is confident they can continue to grow volume at a return that supports the margin target.

The Sydney-based firm lifted its final dividend payout to 78 Australian cents per share, from 63 Australian cents apiece announced a year earlier.

This was far ahead of Citi's estimate of 13.5 Australian cents per share.

(Reporting by Sneha Kumar and Shivangi Lahiri in Bengaluru; Editing by Alan Barona)

((Sneha.Kumar@thomsonreuters.com))