TG

Thank you! That does make sense, and it's a trade off indeed. I guess the reason Markel has longer duration is they exactly try to match their reserves with their claims. Given they are speciality insurers, that makes them more exposed to a longer tail, hence the longer duration too. While that temporarily hurts the portfolio when rates rise, I somewhat feel fine with it if they can lock in new float at higher rates. The billion dollar question however; how high will rates go from here on

I'm always interested as to how the markets perceive this personally. Ranked by duration, I would reckon it goes Berkshire < Fairfax < Markel. Whereas rising rates will (temporarily) flow through as unrealized loss in in BVPS, eventually they will lead to higher interest income. So usually we're talking about a paper loss but the rolling of the portfolio into higher yielding securities I would consider beneficial (depends ofc. too on what end of curve). It's just one of the reasons why I feel BVPS or P/B can be a bit flawed personally, also because it doesn't reflect float. Curious as to how you see this!