By Mathieu Rosemain
PARIS (Reuters) - AXA, Europe's second-biggest insurer, reported 6% growth in first quarter sales on Thursday, led by property damage insurance to companies, its biggest business line.
Total revenue over the first three months of the year grew to 34 billion euros ($36.34 billion) from 31.8 billion euros a year earlier, the French group said in a statement after the market close.
Sales of AXA's so-called commercial lines, or insurance policies for companies, rose by 7% on a comparable basis to 12.1 billion euros, underpinned by its U.S. subsidiary AXA XL Insurance unit as well as higher prices in Turkey and in France and other European markets.
Its two other main divisions - life and health insurance and asset management - also reported higher sales in the first quarter.
AXA's solvency II ratio, a measure of its capital strength under the European Union's risk-measurement rules for insurers, stood at 229% at end of March, or 2 percentage points higher than at the end of 2023.
Asked about the impact of the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in the U.S. city of Baltimore, Chief Financial Officer Alban de Mailly Nesle said he expected related insurance claims to cut less than 100 million euros from the group's pre-tax earnings in 2024.
"We estimate the impact to be 0.1 billion (euros) before tax and after reinsurance based on a total industry impact of 1.5 billion," he told reporters in a call, adding it would be less than this figure.
AXA's commercial insurance unit AXA XL is lead underwriter on the International Group $3.1 billion reinsurance policy for ship insurers.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that insurer Chubb (NYSE:CB) was preparing to make a $350 million payout to the state of Maryland, while Lloyd's of London insurers Hiscox (LON:HSX) and Lancashire do not expect large insurance claims from the bridge collapse.
Separately, AXA said it had dropped the planned sale of a closed life and pensions portfolio from its German subsidiary to Athora Germany. Under the deal announced in July 2022, the sale would have yielded proceeds of 660 million euros.
The end of the sale will have no impact on the group's financial targets as announced in February, it said. AXA also said it had signed a reinsurance agreement for its AXA Life Europe subsidiary with New Reinsurance Company to cover about 3 billion euros of variable annuity reserves.
AXA said it would offset the resulting earnings dilution related from the reinsurance agreement by adding a 200 million-euro share buyback by the end of the year.
($1 = 0.9357 euros)