By Carlos Pallordet

LONDON, Oct 27 - (The Insurer) - The North American insurance composite, compiled by Stonybrook Capital and Weild & Co, rose 0.6% in the week, trailing all major indices.

The S&P 500 index rose 1.9% in the week to Friday.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 was up 2.2%, while the blue-chip Dow Jones industrial average added 2.2%.

Meanwhile, the small cap Russell 2000 increased by 2.5%.

Stonybrook-Weild noted that September’s inflation data, released last week, came in softer than expected, with headline CPI up 0.3% month-on-month versus forecasts of 0.4%.

“This encourages Fed watchers to hold to their forecast of a quarter point drop at next week’s Fed meeting,” the investment banks said.

The banks also highlighted Tuesday’s 5.7% plunge in gold prices – the steepest single-day drop in over five years – which they attributed to easing trade tensions.

The report also noted that the VIX index eased from previously elevated levels, while credit spreads narrowed slightly as investors showed greater risk appetite, signaling improved sentiment and a firmer tone across markets. “Long-term interest rates crept up in response and the dollar weakened, while equities shrugged the concerns off amid good earnings,” the banks said.

“The somewhat better inflation rate may green-light another Fed cut in December, especially given that the Fed will worry that the paucity of economic data with the closure of the government might mask a softening economy: Better safe than sorry,” Stonybrook-Weild concluded.

In the North American insurance composite, advancers led the decliners by 83 to 29, with eight of the 12 industry groups rising in the week.

The two best-performing groups were coastal insurers, up 7.6%, and title insurers, up 4.5%.

Among the former, Universal Insurance topped gains with a 14.1% surge for the week, after the Fort Lauderdale-based homeowners carrier reported a sharp rebound in profitability, helped by benign weather and improving market conditions in Florida.

This was followed by HCI Group and Slide Insurance, which saw their shares rise 8.6% and 7.2%, respectively.

The absence of major hurricanes impacting the U.S. helped drive investor sentiment across the cohort.

Shares in Heritage Insurance increased by 6.3% while the share price of American Integrity, which went public in May, added 4.2%.

The group of standard commercial insurers was up by 1.4%, while specialty commercial insurers added 0.4%.

Meanwhile, shares in reinsurers slid 0.3% on average.

RenaissanceRe saw the largest fall in the group, with shares down 3.0%, following a loss of 3.6% in the previous week.

Everest Group, the largest company in the cohort by market capitalization, shed 0.1% for the week.

In contrast, SiriusPoint and Conduit Holdings trimmed their prior week losses, with shares rising 4.1% and 5.4%, respectively.

The two worst-performing groups in the composite were insurance service providers, down 2.7%, and personal lines insurers, down 2.0%.

Among the latter, Kemper posted the steepest decline, falling 3.0% and erasing the 2.6% gain from the prior week.

Meanwhile, Progressive – the largest company in the cohort by market capitalization – fell by 2.9%, following a loss of 6.0% in the previous week after the U.S. auto insurer reported a steep September earnings miss.

Allstate lost 1.4%, while Mercury General shed 0.7%.

In contrast, insurtechs Porch Group, Lemonade and Hippo experienced the largest gains, with shares up 9.1%, 8.4% and 7.5%, respectively.

Meanwhile, the group of global brokers finished in negative territory for the third consecutive week, with shares down 1.3% on average.

Aon led the losses with a fall of 2.6%, followed by Marsh McLennan, down 1.6%.

Shares in WTW slid 0.5%, while AJ Gallagher, which had fallen 7.0% in the previous week, added 0.1%.

The Stonybrook–Weild North American Insurance composite is up 3.3% on a year-to-date basis.

In this article, we have included a selection of industry comp tables published in full by Stonybrook and Weild & Co in their weekly update.