FORM 425
Filed by Validus Holdings, Ltd. pursuant to Rule 425
under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended,
and deemed filed pursuant to Rule 14a-12
under the Securities Exchange of 1934, as amended
Subject Company: IPC Holdings, Ltd.
(Commission File No.: 000-27662)
On May 5, 2009, Validus Holdings, Ltd. (Validus) held a conference call of analysts and investors
regarding its earnings for the quarter ended March 31, 2009. The following is the transcript of the
call.
Additional Information about the Proposed Transaction and Where to Find It:
This material relates to a proposed business combination transaction between Validus and IPC which
is the subject of an amended preliminary proxy statement that was filed by Validus on May 1, 2009
and a preliminary proxy statement that was filed by Validus on April 16, 2009 and may become the
subject of a registration statement and additional proxy statements filed by Validus with the
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). This material is not a substitute for the preliminary
proxy statements that Validus has filed or proxy statements or a registration statement that
Validus would file with the SEC or any other documents which Validus may send to its or IPCs
shareholders in connection with the proposed transaction. INVESTORS AND SECURITY HOLDERS ARE URGED
TO READ THE PRELIMINARY PROXY STATEMENTS AND ALL OTHER RELEVANT DOCUMENTS FILED, OR THAT WILL BE
FILED, WITH THE SEC, INCLUDING THE DEFINITIVE PROXIES, IF AND WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE BECAUSE
THEY CONTAIN, OR WILL CONTAIN, IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION. All such
documents, if filed, would be available free of charge at the SECs website (www.sec.gov) or by
directing a request to Validus, at Jon Levenson, Senior Vice President, at +1-441-278-9000.
Participants in the Solicitation:
Validus and its directors, executive officers and other employees may be deemed to be participants
in any solicitation of shareholders in connection with the proposed transaction. Information about
Validus directors and executive officers is available in Validus proxy statement, dated March 25,
2009 for its 2009 annual general meeting of shareholders.
MANAGEMENT DISCUSSION SECTION
Operator: Hello, and welcome to the Validus Holdings Limited First Quarter 2009 Conference Call.
All participants will be in a listen-only mode. There will be an opportunity for you to ask
questions at the end of todays presentation. [Operator Instructions] Please note this conference
is being recorded.
Now, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Jon Levenson. Mr. Levenson you may begin.
Jon Levenson, Senior Vice President
Thank you, good morning and welcome to the Validus Holdings conference call for the quarter ended
March 31, 2009.
After the market closed yesterday, we issued an earnings press release and financial supplement,
both of which are available on our website, validusre.bm. Todays call is being webcast and will be
available for replay. Those details are also available on our website.
Leading todays call are Validus Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Ed Noonan, and Validus
Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Jeff Consolino. Before we begin, just a few
regulatory reminders.
Some comments made during this call may be deemed forward-looking statements as defined within US
Federal Securities laws. These statements involve risk, uncertainty and reflect our current view of
future events and financial performance. More detail on this topic can be found in our most recent
Form 10-K annual report and Form 10-Q quarterly report both filed with the US Securities and
Exchange Commission.
Management will also refer to some non-GAAP financial measures when describing the companys
performance. These items are explained on our earnings release and financial supplements. With
that, I will turn the call over to Ed Noonan.
Edward Joseph Noonan, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you Jon and thank you Camille. Good morning everyone. I appreciate your taking the time to
join us today. This is an outstanding quarter for us by every measure. We grew our diluted book
value including dividend by 4.5% in the quarter. We generated a 20.3% operating return on average
equity. We grew our Validus Re subsidiary by 23.9% and we grew our Talbot syndicate by 12.9%.
Important to note, on Talbots growth, on a constant currency basis, growth was actually 25.3%. We
also generated a 75% combined ratio and we outperformed our entire peer group. In short, the
business is shaping up exactly as we described in our fourth quarter conference call. This morning
I would like to have Jeff Consolino walk you through our results, then I will come back to provide
you with more color on the business and afterwards, we will be happy to take any questions you may
have. Jeff.
Joseph E. Consolino, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
The first quarter of 2009 was our best first quarter ever. We saw meaningful growth in gross
premiums written and net premiums earned. We discussed our growth in the Validus Re segment January
1 on our fourth quarter earnings call. We also had strong growth in Talbot segment. In the quarter,
there was an absence of significant worldwide catastrophe or other loss in earnings. In the
quarter, we reported 100.4 million in net operating income. This is the highest level ever for any
first quarter in the time since Validus was formed. We produced annualized operating return on
average shareholders equity of 20.3%. Again, this is the highest ever first quarter operating ROE
for us.
Diluted book value per common share at March 31 was $24.65. This is an increase in the quarter of
3.7%. Growth in diluted book value per share plus accumulated dividend is our preferred measure of
growth in financial network for our shareholders. Adjusted for our $0.20 quarterly dividend,
diluted book value per share increased 4.5% in the first quarter. First quarter net income was 94.9
million or $1.20 per diluted share. Our net operating income in the first quarter of 2009 was 100.4
million or $1.27 per diluted share. Net operating income in the quarter was 34.8 million higher
than the first quarter of 2008, largely due to a 28.5 million increase in underwriting income, a
13.8 million decrease in finance expenses, partially offset by a decline in net investment income
of 9.3 million. Gross premiums written grew by 16.9% on a consolidated basis in the quarter to
609.9 million.
Gross premiums written in the Validus Re segment grew by 23.9% to 410 million. Gross premiums
written in the Talbot segment grew by 12.9% to 227.9 million. Talbots reported growth was impeded
by unfavorable year-over-year exchange rate differences and the segment showed underlying growth of
25.3% in constant currency rates. Better than half of our reported growth for the quarter in the
Talbot segment is attributable to our new venture riding Latin American and onshore energy
business.
Our quarterly combined ratio was 75.0%, a 7.4 percentage point improvement over the first quarter
of 2008. Favorable development in the quarter was 8.1 million, which benefited our loss ratio by
2.5 percentage points. In the quarter, we recorded 6.9 million of loss expense for European
windstorm Klaus and 6.6 million for the Australian wildfires. These items including our loss ratio
contributed 4.2 percentage points to the loss ratio.
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Our consolidated investment portfolio was 3.46 billion at March 31, 2009. We continue to emphasize
our very conservative strategy, which emphasizes liquidity and preservation of invested assets. Our
portfolio is all fixed income and approximately 69% in cash, short-term investments, agency paper
and sovereign securities. This is up 4 percentage points from last quarter. The portfolio remains
well diversified, liquid and has a short average duration of 1.8 years and an average credit
quality of AA plus. At March 31, we had no investment in equities and we have no investments in
hedge funds, funds of funds or any other alternative class.
We have been investing our cash in the first quarter after building cash through the latter half of
2008. However, we have been investing prudently and with our 148.5 million of cash flow from
operations in the quarter, our cash position has risen to 535.8 million, this is now 15.5% of our
portfolio. Net investment income was 26.8 million in the quarter, a sequential decrease over the
fourth quarter of last year of 12.7%. The annualized average quarterly yield on our fixed
maturities portfolio sell from 4.04% to 3.68% continuing the trend of the last several quarters.
The annualized average quarterly yields on our total portfolio including cash fell from 3.75% to
3.18%, thanks to the larger cash balances and low cash yield.
We are planning for the consolidation of a $2.2 billion investment portfolio later this year, which
has some equities, alternatives and a greater concentration in corporate bonds. As a result, we are
very comfortable keeping a highly liquid tack. Some of our net realized and unrealized gains and
losses on the portfolio in the quarter is a modest $1.3 million loss.
In this quarter, we need to look at realized and unrealized together due to the CMBS liquidation we
effected in the first quarter and mentioned on our fourth quarter call. This CMBS sale resulted in
19.5 million in realized losses and an equal and offsetting reversal of the unrealized loss
associated with the portfolio. This came through as a negative loss or gain in the unrealized line.
We are pleased to achieve a positive investment return again in this quarter and we are at peace
with the idea of sacrificing yield for stability and liquidity. We recognize that we will make our
returns through underwriting activities and not through investment leverage. Our stockholders
equity at March 31, 2009 is 2.02 billion. Our total capitalization is 2.33 billion.
We have the proper balance sheet and capital position to pursue the opportunities presenting
themselves to us in 2009, which Ed will now describe in further detail.
Edward Joseph Noonan, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you Jeff. So, let me start by discussing our results at our Talbot syndicate. The big picture
is that we are seeing rate increases in 16 of the 18 classes we write with the other two classes
essentially neutral.
Our new ventures in Energy, Singapore and Latin America are all contributing strongly to our
growth. Talbot continues to be conservative in their underwriting reserving with emphasis on
diversification both among classes of risk and through global geographic diversification. On a
specific level, hull and cargo rates were up 3 to 6% despite the global decline in values. This
class is likely to be affected by the global slowdown. But at this point the market is showing
strong discipline.
Our war and terrorism account is performing extremely well. We are seeing significant additional
premiums as a result of piracy being moved out of hull insurance and into the war risk product. Our
terrorism book is growing nicely as a result of a few new facilities as well as our positioning
outside of Pool Re in the UK, which makes us one of a limited number of carriers of private UK
terror coverage.
We are seeing good rate increases in our energy account. In the offshore segment, we are seeing 10%
increases for non-wind risk and a multiple of that for anything with wind exposure. We expect many
of the major oil companies to increase their retained risk as a result of market conditions.
In our Validus Re segment, the high points are constricted supply as a result of capital depletion,
coupled with increased demand of roughly 10% as buyers are also faced with capital depletion, led
to rate in-
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creases of 10 to 15% globally at January 1, which continued through the April 1 renewals. Our
expectation is that rates will increase further at June and July and will likely be at least 20%.
Most of our growth is attributable to rate increase and to a lesser extent shifts in mix of
business. Weve reduced our net risk from offshore energy modestly, although reinsurance rates were
up 25 to 30% in the Gulf of Mexico with extraordinarily restricted terms and conditions associated
with it.
For the full year, we will run the same level of aggregate US wind risk as we did in 2008,
consistent with our capitalization. Our catastrophe portfolio has generated underwriting profits
every year including 2008, and we feel the portfolio is even better positioned and priced for this
wind season.
Regarding Florida, we believe the elimination of $2 billion in TICL coverage will likely create
demand for about $700 million in private reinsurance. The market capacity should be just able to
meet this demand although it will create upward rate pressure across all Florida placements.
In summary, we are in a great environment for the Validus group. We are seeing rates increased at
an accelerating rate for most of our products. Both of our operating subsidiaries are growing
strongly with expanding margins. Our balance sheet is pristine at a time when some of the largest
players in our market are reducing their business due to financial weakness.
In short, the Validus business model is extremely well positioned both in the curve market and over
the new few years. Our ability to expand margins without increasing risks in our catastrophe
portfolio while growing our global non-catastrophe business through our public syndicates delivers
exceptional value to our current shareholders and can be applied to the benefit of IPC shareholders
as well. We know how to build a broadly diversified profit intensive business. We know how to
create superior returns through better operating leverage and we have a track record of moving
quickly to recruit the best teams to capitalize our market dislocation. This is what will bring the
IPC shareholders and last Thursday we laid out the path for them to make their own choice and both
their shares to Validus can complete the acquisition expeditiously.
So, I would like to stop there and take any questions you might have.
QUESTION AND ANSWER SECTION
Operator: Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question will come from Matt Carletti from
Fox-Pitt Kelton. Please go ahead.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Hey good morning. Quick question, maybe, for you Jeff, first is
on numbers. The G&A expenses in the quarter were up a bit for the past several quarters, although
not that much from Q1 08, is there a seasonality to that number that we should expect or is it a
little more random than that?
<A Joseph Consolino>: There is seasonality to it Matt. This is associated with the
seasonality in our business. One component of our G&A is management incentive compensation, and if
you read our proxy, none of executive management in Validus received a bonus-incentive compensation
in 2008, because we didnt meet our return on capital targets. What we do is we accrue that bonus
at our target level for the group through six months. And then in the third quarter as the outcome
of wind season becomes more clear, then we start evaluating how we spot into our financial scale,
thanks to Gustav and Ike. Obviously we knew we would be at a much lower level for the group as a
whole including nothing for the executives. We started to reverse that accrual in Q3 and Q4. That
is why youll see a roughly comparable Q1 09 versus Q1 08.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Okay. That is very helpful. And then if I might, second question
just on the kind of buy line or buy premiums within both Validus and Talbot, could you give a
little more color on obviously property marine looks very nice growth, specialty was a bit more
treading water. Can you talk a little bit about what is driving that underneath the surface?
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<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: Yes, I think that in the specialty lines, we are seeing as I
mentioned growth in the terrorism portfolio.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Right.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: But some of the other specialty classes, the war risk, while
we are seeing more business move out of the hull policy and into the war risk, war risk is
generally down year-on-year. We are also seeing some of the smaller lines, things like contingency
and bloodstock are kind of treading water and the accident and health portfolio is down
year-on-year. Those make up the majority of our specialty business. Our bankers blanket bond
business is also off roughly 8% year-on-year. So, not technical and very directly the function of
underwriting strategies that we kind of built into our business plan at the start of the year.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Okay, are those also the lines some of those lines of
business, the ones that are say not seeing rate increases or lower rate increases than your
other segments?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: I would say that really the only line that we are not seeing
material rate increase is terrorism. We are off about 2.2% year-on-year in the terrorism class. The
trend minus is better on that. Terrorism rates have been declining anywhere from 10 to 12%. So, we
are trending back up for it or at least the rate of decrease has slowed dramatically. So, it feels
like we have gotten to a bottom there. But terrorism is really the only class where we are seeing
any negative rate movements at this point.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Okay, and last question, offshore energy, Gulf of Mexico, some
others in the market have commented that there is a late renewal season and you saw a lot of
some premiums that might have normally renewed in Q1, be in Q2. Are you seeing that in your book?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: No, not very much Matt. We, as part of our planning process,
we mapped out the accounts we want to write for the year, and as a result of that, we had
identified going back to 2006, the business we wanted to write in the Gulf of Mexico and this is
really only in the reinsurance segment. And so, most of business that we wrote, we had either
written at January 1 or shortly thereafter. Most of the reinsurance placements did get done in the
first quarter.
What is happening in the direct insurance market is a lot of buyers are kind of playing chicken and
waiting to buy as long as possible both in the hopes that the market will soften somewhat or at
least the rate of increase will slow. And also just to avoid paying for to cover for much before
wind season. That is not a big segment for us. Our Talbot syndicate where we write the offshore
insurance portfolio only has $25 million of Gulf of Mexico wind aggregates in total. And so really
we use that aggregate to support global accounts where we have to provide some capacity. So, that
wouldnt be a big driver for our results. I think some of the other carriers that write more of a
direct insurance portfolio in the Gulf of Mexico would be more subject to those conditions.
<Q Matthew Carletti>: Great, thanks thats very helpful and congrats on the nice
quarter.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: Thank you Matt.
<A Joseph Consolino>: Thanks Matt.
Operator: Our next question comes from Ian Gutterman from Adage Capital. Please go ahead.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Hi, guys. First one, Jeff what is the silos test for the quarter?
<A Joseph Consolino>: Hang on one second Ian, let me pull that number out.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: While you are looking, maybe I will just ask one for Ed. What was
the breakdown in the premium growth between pricing and units, can you give a rough sense of that?
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<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: Sure, in the reinsurance segment, across the entire
portfolio we are probably looking at out of the roughly 23 or 24% growth, we would say that 12 to
13% of that is rate. An additional significant component of it is shift in mix of business. This is
particularly true of the Gulf of Mexico. A number of the programs that we write were carriers who
were buying it on a straight excess basis before. This year they switched to buying quarter share
of their wind policies. From our standpoint, our attachment is the same and our limit is the same,
but again then premium released for the capital charges and so that also carries the
proportional carries a higher premium, but the ultimate loss ratios and economic outcomes are the
same.
So, when you back all that out, the exposure growth in the portfolio mostly came from the
international segment and reinsurance, where we expanded our European aggregates to January 1 and
we also expanded our Japanese aggregates a bit at April 1. The Japanese aggregates are up first
because market pricing was up. And second, Mark Haushofer, who we hired to head up our Asian Treaty
representative office has run Munich Re of Asia for many years, has been in the Tokyo market for
many years, has great relationships there. And we just have access to some business, but isnt
generally placed in the open market that we didnt have access to before. So that is really kind of
a breakdown in growth in the reinsurance segment.
On the Talbot side, rate increase, out of the 12.9%, rate increase would be roughly 5 to 5.5% of
that. The balance would be exposure growth and it is coming from our new onshore energy team, which
rides through the syndicate. Most of that business is international in nature, because we are very
restrictive on the US CAD component of that. But more than two-thirds of the onshore energy is
being written internationally and there we are beneficiary of some of the pullback of peoples
placement with AIG amongst others. We are seeing good growth out of Singapore, part of that is
because of the energy team we have brought on board. One of the key underwriters is out in
Singapore. We are not actually growing the energy portfolio very rapidly in Singapore, but just the
market contacts have been a good source of additional direct insurance and back opportunities with
syndicates.
And then lastly, our Latin American business, which we started in late 2007, we really have an
excellent team on the ground covering Latin America, and we are just seeing good growth in the
syndicate as a result of having that team on the ground. We recently opened a representative office
in Santiago, Chile, because we have got good opportunities there and again the energy team that we
brought on board has always had a materials component to their portfolio in Latin America. So the
Talbot syndicate I would say that is a little less than half of what you are seeing in growth as
rate increased in the balance, it is really coming mostly from the new classes that we have added.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay that makes sense.
<A Joseph Consolino>: Ian, coming back to the silos test.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Yes.
<A Joseph Consolino>: The silos test for the quarter was 361,000.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay.
<A Joseph Consolino>: Thats obviously a significant drop-off year-over-year, but at
this point we have no third party capital in either the 2008 or 2009 year of account. So, it is
only the remainder of the 2007 year of account thats going to incur finance expenses.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay. Great, I thought it would be small, wasnt sure how exactly
how small. Just a follow-up on that, so then the reinsurance shift from x about a quarter share, I
understand that its priced to the same returns and so forth and if you are using the same limit,
that is not a concentration risk, but should I think then we will see a little bit higher combined
ratios in reinsurance, so that the actual premium comes with a higher combined ratio you get to the
same underwriting profit?
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<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: You know, it is such a small part of the book. I mean, it
represents the material part of this growth in the marine portfolio, because the only place that we
have seen this is really in the Gulf of Mexico.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: It shouldnt have any material distortion in terms of
certainly the economic results. You could see a bit up of a pick-up in acquisition expense, because
on pro rata contracts you typically do pay some commission, they are not particularly high
commission, and as I said the attachment limits in overall economics are identical to it and so it
shouldnt have much of a distorting impact.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Got it, okay, and then just lastly if I can ask, a quick one on
IPC, can you just talk about how you can close the deal by June with this three-step process and
maybe breakdown how long steps two and three take from whenever it happens, because I guess my
confusion is if you dont know when the vote takes place, how do you know you can do it by June?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: Now that is an excellent point and there has been a lot of
talk about the closing of the other IPC transaction in June and we announced last Thursday our plan
to achieve a closing on substantially the same timeframe as that other transaction.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Right.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: What we are asking for is pretty simple. A vote no against
the Max takeover. We think that gets us in a position to get this done properly and that is just a
majority now, they would make that happen and all kinds of few things happened for IPC and for us
if that no vote comes through. Once the no vote comes through, there would be three things that
could happen. First, we do have a fully executed amalgamation agreement in front of the IPC board
which they could execute and back, but we also announced last week our intention to commence an
exchange offer and that exchange offer would be set to close shortly after the IPC vote on the
other transaction and so shareholders of IPC if they wanted our merger consideration, they would
vote no on the other transaction exchange into the exchange offer and we could close promptly
within a week or two after the vote.
We also have this alternative track of the scheme of arrangement which is another means of the
business combination that is present in Bermuda and other Commonwealth countries, that would take
slightly longer to achieve, because it would require two shareholder meetings, so the track would
be several weeks behind the exchange offer but the advantage of this scheme of arrangement is that,
that could be achieved with a 75% vote of the IPC shareholders rather than the 90% condition we are
putting on the exchange offer. Either way those two outcomes could be achieved without the
cooperation of the IPC Board, although once the no vote was obtained we would certainly hope that
the IPC Board would talk to us, because they would be free to talk to us and we could conclude our
transaction properly.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay so, then, so, what are the are there any potential hurdles
as far as again let us see if there ends up being a no vote that any filings with the SEC or
anything like that could delay that tender offer to make that take longer? But are there any
possible hurdles in that or has all that stuff already been filed?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: We have not yet filed their exchange offer, but we can
commence the exchange offer without the exchange offer document being cleared by the SEC.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: We will remind you that we filed a proxy with the SEC for
the no vote as well as a proxy with the SEC to permit us to issue our shares in the transaction and
we would expect these proxies will be cleared by the time this happens. As conditions on the
backend of the exchange offer and we do require notice from the Bermuda Monetary Authority. We obtained that in
18 days on Tal-
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bot and we also require consent to both the IPC and the Validus Bank Groups, which we
think is a short process as well.
<Q Ian Gutterman>: Okay, great. I will let other people get in. Thanks.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] Our next question will come from Brian Meredith from UBS. Please
go ahead.
<Q Brian Meredith>: Great, good morning everybody. Couple of questions here for you,
Jeff can you give us a sense of what the transaction costs may look like for the second quarter for
the IPC bid? Just from an expense standpoint, what impact it may have on the second quarter
results?
<A Joseph Consolino>: Brian, there will clearly be expense thanks to 141R.
<Q Brian Meredith>: Yes.
<A Joseph Consolino>: Taxes are no longer capitalized there. They are running through
the income statement. I would prefer to let our proxy statement kind of speak for itself, it
certainly will be some impact, but we dont think it will be a large distorting item in the
quarter.
<Q Brian Meredith>: Okay, great. And then the second question is, Ed, does the IPC
transaction here impact at all your June or July 1 renewal kind of discussions, and when you are
kind of thinking about what business you are going to write in your portfolio?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: No, I think, Brian, the short answer is we have to write our
business consistent with our original business plan. We do have some hedging alternatives that
present themselves to us that as we get closer to the transaction, we may put into place that would
serve the effect of reducing Validus US wind exposure so as to mitigate the overall exposure to
the combined entity, you know, that is a good option for us.
The other thing I would say is that in this pricing environment and with the combined
capitalization of the two companies, this isnt a bad time to be writing the catastrophe
reinsurance. And given that, if you look at IPC and Validus last year, if Ike was a one-in-fifteen
year event, we both made money in our catastrophe portfolios. So I think when you look at the
combination of pricing, when you look at how attachment points in the market have moved up in the
post-Katrina period, this is a pretty good time to be writing cap business despite, by far the best
price risk class in the global market. And so, while we have the ability to hedge, we also wouldnt
have any hesitation to go into wind season with the combined portfolio. It is well priced, and I
think our portfolio is extremely well structured. I think IPC has historically done a pretty good
job on US wind as well.
<Q Brian Meredith>: Okay. So what you are saying is that any opportunities out there
just wont have any impact on it?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: No, we have a bit of optionality, but from our standpoint
Validus can be easily execute its current business plan with or without the IPC transactions.
<Q Brian Meredith>: Excellent, thank you.
Operator: Our next question will come from Ron Bobman from Capital Returns. Please go ahead.
<Q Ron Bobman>: Hi, I had actually a question on the transaction prospect as well. My
question is how do you waive your due diligence or get comfortable in effect waiving your due
diligence? I guess I am really focused on is the assumed book of business that if you succeed, you
would be taking on.
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: So, Ron, thats a great question. One of the really
attractive things about IPC from our perspective is that it is a very straightforward company. They
write virtually in a portfo-
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lio solely comprised of catastrophe writing. Given that we are in a
syndicated business, we know the vast, vast majority of the accounts they are on. We have already
looked at them, we have already priced them, we have already scrubbed the data, we already have the
data in our data warehouse. Many of them we are already on. So, to a significant extent we know the
customers, we know the programs. We may not know all of the attachment points and specific layering
but there are very few deals out there in the world that we dont already have modeled in our
warehouse.
So, it is relatively straightforward exercise to go through our international portfolio and
identify the IPC clients with a pretty high degree of certainty. And then for US clients, it is
very straightforward, just going to schedule out, you are able to identify all the cedants that
purchase reinsurance from IPC. So, we are able to get our hands around their portfolio pretty well.
We also like the fact that IPC like Validus restricts their aggregates in any one zone, in their
case the 70% of capital and ours the 65%. That also gives us a pretty good sense of exposure. We do
have some other insight to the company just from employees we have, that have worked there in the
past that have been to help us understand how they think about risk, how they think about managing
zonal aggregates etc. So we have, I think a relatively high level of transparency into their
operating business.
I will let Jeff address the financial questions for a minute, because I think that is also a key
part of the diligence.
<A Joseph Consolino>: Sure, Ron. The question was I think how we waive our due
diligence requirements. Obviously, we did all the work we could that Ed referred to on the
business. But in addition, we do have two documents. It wouldnt really have in a traditional
company sale if this were say a private company. The first is that at the time we initiated this
offer, IPC had recently filed their Form 10-K and a Form 10-K is required to contain all material
information about the business and there are sanctions for not making the appropriate disclosures
of both civil and criminal. That is a lot stronger of a inducement for people to provide
appropriate disclosure than just what you get from an investment bankers book. We also launched
the offering for IPC after they filed their joint proxy statement on the other transaction and that
included financial projection for IPC, and whereas in a lot of processes you might see hockey
sticks style projection, these are furnished and filed again with the SEC. And we would expect that
they would reflect managements best judgment at that time. And so we really did have from public
sources not only on the business side but also with the filings, we take a lot of current
information, and you got to keep in mind also that this is a business that has 258 clients in 2008.
So, it is not really a large global legacy company, they are in our markets, they are around the
corner from us, easily understood.
<Q Ron Bobman>: Thanks, just so I understand, so drilling down just one more layer, so
if I were to ask you, what level of confidence that you have that IPCs exposure to South Miami or
Dade County or the New Orleans basin is x. Do you really have the insight as to what those are
local or sort of in fact local exposures are to then overlay with your obviously known local
exposures?
<A Edward Joseph Noonan>: Yes, so, I mean this is actually particularly in the United
States one of the great things about the disclosure requirements. Everybody, every US buyer, who
purchases cover from IPC has to record it on their scheduled adds, since IPC only writes cat, it is
anything that is coming to them is cat. We then simply cross reference those buyers against the
data set we already have. All of those US companies with virtually no exceptions, we already have
all of their individual street level data, we have already scrubbed it. We have already run it
through all through the commercial models as well as our own model. We have already put in our
data warehouse and so we are able to easily announce simulate, our portfolio combine with the IPC
portfolio from a ground up basis on using the combined data. We know our participations obviously.
We are then able to go across and look at where make various assumptions about where IPC might
participate if they participate down very low, what would the exposures look like if they
participate vertically across the program what do the exposures look like. Doing that, we are able
to construct a series of current curves and aggregate curves for the combined portfolio. And I
think I wouldnt say that they are perfect, but they are not, there is not a very big miss factor
associated with them per US risk. On top of that, IPC writes some retro, they dont write a
huge retro portfolio that covers US risk. So, again relatively easy to get our hands around. And so
particularly for the US ex-
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posures, we have got street level data for the combined portfolio the
same as we would for the Validus portfolio.
<Q Ron Bobman>: Okay thanks a ton, very, very helpful.
Operator: We show no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the conference back over
to Ed Noonan, for any closing remarks.
Edward Joseph Noonan, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Well thank you very much Camille. I appreciate everybody taking the time to be with us today and
for your interesting questions. One time and then I want to finish with you, I think in this back
and forth over the IPC deal both sides have presented their case very forcefully, and I think that
is appropriate. I think the one thing that I would observe is that Max is a company that we know
well and Marty Becker is somebody that I know well, Marty Becker is somebody that I respect. There
is from our perspective hasnt been any personal aspect of this and no way is there any personal
aspect, I mean Marty is the guy that, I think has accomplished a lot in his career and from our
perspective he has made an excellent deal for his shareholders. We just think that we have got a
better deal for the IPC shareholders and so to the extent that there is any kind back and forth
that was perceived as personal in nature, that clearly hasnt been the case more perspective. So,
with that, thank you all for taking the time to join us this morning.
Operator: The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending todays presentation. You may
now disconnect.
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