The 72% does not include overhead or sales and marketing, just losses and LAE. I wouldn't call that very good. Their combined ratio is more like 200%

Thanks. I was looking for their combined ratio. I suppose it’s not surprising that overhead is high for a fast-growing company. As with many startups, GAAP only reveals part of the story and more fine-grained metrics are needed to gauge potential future profitability.

For those unfamiliar with the combined ratio, taking a stab at an explanation by simplified analogy…

For most normal companies:

              Revenue
  −     Cost of goods
  ———————————————————
         Gross income
  −   Operating costs
  ———————————————————
     Operating income
  −  Interest expense
  ———————————————————
           Net income

For insurance companies:

             Premiums
  −            Losses
  ———————————————————
        “Gross income”
  −  “Operating costs”
  ———————————————————
    “Operating income”
  + Investment income
  ———————————————————
           Net income

Most normal companies use profitability metrics:

      Gross margin =     Gross income / Revenue
  Operating margin = Operating income / Revenue

Insurance companies use inverted expense ratios:

        Loss ratio =                       Losses / Premiums
    Combined ratio = (Losses + “Operating costs”) / Premiums

(The above is obviously simplified, for the sake of illustrating by analogy. For instance, insurance companies usually won’t have “Gross income” in their financial statements, and “Operating costs” and “Operating income” are typically called “Underwriting expense” and “Underwriting gain”.)

In their most recent quarter--

  Net earned premium 25.3
  Net investment income 0.9
  -------------------------------------   
  Total revenue 26.2
  
  Expense
  
  Loss and loss adjustment expense, net 18.2
  Other insurance expense 3.3
  Sales and marketing 19.2
  Technology development 3.5
  General and administrative 18.2
  -------------------------------------   
  Total expense 62.4
  
  Loss before income taxes (36.2)

18.2 / 25.3 ain’t bad. Sales and marketing at 19.2 seems a bit high, but I guess they’re doubling down on growth, and it implies they have a long runway. The administrative costs is the one that you’ll want to see grow logarithmically, as 25.3 goes up, and it’s not unbelievable that it will.

> 18.2 / 25.3 ain’t bad.

It's somewhat worse than average, but trending in the right direction. Will give a qualified "OK".

> Sales and marketing at 19.2 seems a bit high, but I guess they’re doubling down on growth, and it implies they have a long runway.

It's very high, relative to written premium. You can always buy market share in insurance by increasing commissions and/or increasing marketing, and it's okay to overspend in the beginning for branding/momentum purposes, but it's not sustainable. They raised $500 MM, and spent $200 MM (and much of the remaining $300 MM is needed for statutory surplus) so who knows how much longer they can sustain that.

Administrative and tech I'm somewhat sanguine about, as long as they keep moving upmarket to Homeowners' insurance. Renters' insurance is never going to have a great margin. Tech is at least decent, and hopefully the kernel for expanding easily into other markets.

Agreed on all points. The only caveat I’d add is that they might not need all of that 300mm if they have a decent reinsurance deal on the books or in the hand. My guess is that they plan on keeping all of the expense rows more or less the same, while growing into new markets to increase their volume.

> how strongly they're investing in growth

The combined LR isn't 72%. The combined LR includes marketing and sales.

I'd argue the pure LR should be evaluated without respect to growth. If you want to adjust for growth look at the combined LR which doesn't look too pretty. But if they can manage to get that LTV it will be a big success

How to get there:

1) Grow really big with VC money (You'll need this for step 3)

2) Stop paying out claims with made-up reasons

3) If someone sues you to get their payout, use your massive resources to bankrupt them with legal fees