Nationwide Reports Solid Growth, Strong Capital Position in 2017

COLUMBUS, Ohio, April 9 -- Nationwide Mutual Insurance issued the following news release:

Nationwide reported $46.5 billion in total sales, up more than $3 billion from 2016, in its 2017 annual report, released today. The company posted $27.5 billion in operating revenue and $562 million in net operating income and paid $18.7 billion in total claims and benefits to policyholders.

"While our financial services business achieved record growth as more members than ever relied on us to help prepare for retirement, our property and casualty business helped our members, partners and communities rebuild following the wrath of two hurricanes and historic wildfires," said Nationwide CEO Steve Rasmussen. "2017 marked another year that Nationwide was true to our mission and continued to fulfill our promise to protect what's most important."

Nationwide drove profitable growth and maintained an exceptionally strong capital position, despite record P&C industry catastrophe losses in 2017. Many product lines performed well, helping to offset those few areas that were pressured during the year.

"Nationwide's breadth of financial services, commercial and personal lines solutions enabled us to continue to drive strong results during a year marked by significant weather activity and industry disruptions," said Nationwide Chief Financial Officer Mark Thresher. "Our strong offering of competitive products and a focus on new and emerging distribution channels drove double digit growth in our financial services business. At the same time, efforts to address industrywide loss trends in standard auto led to strong improvement in profitability."

The company's investment portfolio topped the $100 billion-mark growing to $104.5 billion by the end of 2017. Total policyholders' equity grew to $22.4 billion, up from $21.8 billion at the end of 2016. Statutory surplus - a measure of financial strength and claims-paying ability - was $14.7 billion.

"While catastrophe activity put pressure on our profitability in certain lines, our financial foundation is strong because we reserve capital for these types of losses. As a result, we are able to continue our focus on protecting what's most important for our members and building for the future," said Thresher.