Loews Profit Rises 14% as Hotels Offset CNA Underwriting Strain
Loews Corp posted second-quarter net income of $444 million, or $2.16 a share, even as its CNA insurance unit's underlying combined ratio held near 94% for a second straight quarter.
Loews Corp (L) reported second-quarter net income of $444 million, or $2.16 a share, up 14% from $391 million, or $1.87 a share, a year earlier. The gain marked a reversal from the first quarter, when net income fell to $337 million from $370 million a year earlier, and the swing from a year-over-year decline to a year-over-year increase in a single quarter set the tone for the period.
The divergence beneath that headline number was the story. CNA Financial, Loews' largest subsidiary, has now posted three straight quarters of declining core income on a year-over-year basis: $317 million in the fourth quarter of 2025 versus $342 million a year earlier, $225 million in the first quarter of 2026 versus $281 million, and $324 million in the second quarter versus $335 million. The underlying property-casualty combined ratio, which strips out reserve development, worsened to 94.2% in the second quarter from 92.3% in the fourth quarter of 2025, with the underlying loss ratio up 2.6 points from a year earlier even as it held flat sequentially at 64.1%.
CNA's headline combined ratio told a different story, improving to 96.5% in the second quarter from 102.2% in the first, when the unit absorbed $100 million of unfavorable prior-year reserve development that did not recur. Chief executive Chris Wandell attributed slowing premium growth — net written premium rose 4% in the second quarter after just 1% in the first — to deliberate pricing discipline rather than softening demand, pointing to 11% new business growth and retention holding at 83%.
Loews Hotels was the clearer bright spot. Adjusted EBITDA climbed to $137 million from $109 million a year earlier, a 26% increase that followed 53% growth in the first quarter, when EBITDA rose to $124 million from $81 million. The year-over-year growth rate decelerated even as the dollar figure kept climbing, a pattern the company tied to the ramp of its Orlando property and the completed renovation of its Miami Beach hotel. Loews disclosed occupancy and rate metrics for the segment for the first time this quarter — occupancy rose to 81% from 78% and average daily rates rose 7% — a level of detail absent from the prior two releases.
Boardwalk Pipelines, Loews' natural-gas transportation unit, delivered EBITDA of $279 million, up from $274 million a year earlier but down sharply from $360 million in the first quarter, a step-down the company attributed to normal seasonal demand patterns rather than any operating deterioration. The pipeline unit's growth-project backlog, last quantified in the third quarter of 2025 at 4.2 Bcf/d and roughly $3.0 billion in aggregate cost, was not restated with an updated figure in the second-quarter release, which referred only qualitatively to a "current slate of growth projects".
CNA also disclosed a $1 billion repositioning of its long-term-care investment portfolio, swapping 5.2%-yielding BBB+ five-year bonds for 6.1%-yielding A+ longer-dated bonds and extending the portfolio's duration to roughly 10 years from about 9.5 years, a transaction not mentioned in prior-quarter releases. Loews received $194 million in subsidiary distributions during the quarter, including $119 million in CNA dividends and $75 million from Boardwalk, bringing year-to-date subsidiary cash receipts to $885 million — a figure that includes a one-time $497 million special dividend CNA paid earlier in the first half that had not previously been disclosed.
Book value per share excluding accumulated other comprehensive income rose $2.07 in the quarter to $99.27, a larger sequential gain than the first quarter's $1.31 increase, while book value including AOCI rose to $93.52 from $90.90, reflecting a bigger contribution from investment marks in the period. Parent-company cash and investments slipped to $4.4 billion from $4.5 billion in the first quarter, the first sequential decline after three consecutive quarterly increases from $3.6 billion in the third quarter of 2025, even as parent debt held steady at $1.8 billion.
Loews accelerated share repurchases considerably, buying back 1.4 million shares for $146 million in the second quarter compared with 0.3 million shares for $31 million in the first, a nearly fivefold increase in buyback spending quarter over quarter.