Sampo Balances Underwriting Quality With Growth; We Think the Former Takes Precedent

Sampo is an efficiently run Nordics-based personal lines insurer that tends to focus on improving its underwriting quality year on year—be that through holding on to customers for longer and therefore paying less in acquisition costs; be that through the digitalization of its operations and extraction of expenses; be that through scale and negotiation power with its partners such as BMW, Ford, Mercedes, Nissan, Nordea, Volkswagon, Volvia; or be that through an ability to select lower-cost customers in terms of claims, or customers that are willing to pay that little bit more in price. Sampo has proved this ability year on year and tends to invest around EUR 100 million a year to achieve this. We think the savings the company has generated from these investments have more than covered their cost and more than covered the returns the business was already generating. In other words, we believe these investments have been value-accretive.