Munich Re publishes Q3 2021 numbers

Munich Re has published its financial results for the third quarter of 2021, and the German reinsurer says it is on track to meet the company’s annual target.

Here’s how Munich Re performed in Q3, as well as in the first nine months of the year:

“Hurricane Ida caused losses amounting to €1.2 billion, while Storm Bernd resulted in losses amounting to €0.6 billion, of which €0.1 billion was attributable to ERGO,” noted Munich Re. “The quarterly result was impacted by higher-than-expected expenditure totalling around €170 million on COVID-19-related losses in life and health reinsurance business. High losses were incurred again in particular in the USA, India, and South Africa.”

The group continued: “In property-casualty reinsurance, by contrast, COVID-19 losses were significantly below expectations, with virtually no pandemic losses incurred in Q3. In the ERGO field of business, COVID-19 expenditure had an adverse earnings impact of €12 million in Q3.

“Overall, Iosses attributable to COVID-19 totalled €680 million in the reinsurance field of business for Q1-3, with around €470 million attributable to life and health reinsurance and around €210 million to property-casualty reinsurance. Nine months into 2021, ERGO posted only minor losses related to COVID-19.”

Munich Re added that it now expects COVID-19 losses for its reinsurance field of business to amount to around €800 million for the whole year, with around €600 million from life and health reinsurance and the remainder from property and casualty. The full-year estimate for ERGO stands at around €20 million to €30 million.

Commenting on the interim results, chief financial officer Christoph Jurecka said: “Our annual target of €2.8 billion remains within reach, thanks to a gratifying operational performance and high investment results.”

Excluding insurance-related investments, Munich Re’s investment result in the quarter rose from €1.69 billion previously to €2.11 billion this time around.