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KMPR, Kemper

Insurance — Property & Casualty financial

Kemper is an insurance holding company that offers complementary insurance products, through its subsidiaries, including personal and commercial automobile insurance to consumers in targeted markets and industries.

Kemper also offers life and other insurance solutions to customers who desire basic protection for themselves and their families.

With approximately $12.5 billion in assets, Kemper is improving the world of insurance by providing affordable and easy-to-use personalized solutions to individuals, families and businesses through its Kemper Auto and Kemper Life brands.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

KMPR · Kemper

The business

What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.

Revenue · FY2025

$4.8B

+3.5% YoY · −2% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $4.7B 5-yr avg $5.1B

Loss ratio 65%

Return on equity 2% 5-yr avg −2%

Next report By 8/9 · the 10-Q for the quarter ended late June · due within 40 days of period end · has filed ~36 days after · the wire records it on arrival

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.

What moves the needle: Underwriting discipline and the float. What decides it: whether the combined ratio stays below 100% so the policies make money on their own, how large the float is against equity, and what that float earns once it is invested. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?: Claims run 65% of premiums, with underwriting costs on top. Book value per share, the measure Berkshire is judged on, has compounded about 1% a year across the record. The float runs about 2.3× equity, the leverage that magnifies both the underwriting and the investing. Whether the discipline holds through a soft market, and how the float is invested, are what the 10-K decides.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$2.5B	$2.7B	$3.7B	$5.0B	$5.2B	$5.7B	$5.6B	$4.9B	$4.6B	$4.8B	$4.7B	RevenueRevenue
$2.2B	$2.4B	$3.4B	$4.5B	$4.7B	$5.2B	$5.2B	$4.5B	$4.2B	$4.4B	$4.3B	Premiums earnedPremiums
$298M	$327M	$341M	$364M	$348M	$427M	$423M	$420M	$408M	$405M	$411M	Investment incomeInv. inc.
$4M	$161M	$199M	$662M	$510M	($245M)	($390M)	($347M)	$389M	$161M	—	Pretax incomePretax
$17M	$121M	$190M	$531M	$410M	($124M)	($287M)	($272M)	$318M	$143M	$42M	Net incomeNet inc.
—	26%	5%	20%	20%	—	—	—	20%	17%	4%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$241M	$241M	$539M	$534M	$448M	$351M	($210M)	($134M)	$383M	$585M	$493M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
—	$228M	$524M	$502M	$412M	$293M	($241M)	($188M)	$330M	$554M	$460M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
80%	78%	73%	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	65%	Loss ratioLoss
9%	8%	7%	9%	14%	13%	14%	13%	13%	13%	13%	Expense ratioExpense
($21M)	$19M	($7M)	($71M)	$36M	$107M	($15M)	$160M	$23M	—	—	Prior-yr reserve developmentReserve dev.
1%	6%	6%	13%	9%	-3%	-11%	-11%	11%	5%	2%	Return on equityROE
−2%	3%	4%	12%	7%	−5%	−14%	−14%	9%	2%	−1%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
$49M	$50M	$56M	$68M	$79M	$81M	$80M	$80M	$80M	$80M	$78M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$4M	$0	$0	$0	$110M	$162M	$0	$0	$39M	$302M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
($238M)	($105M)	($498M)	($633M)	($757M)	($118M)	($108M)	$108M	($244M)	$336M	—	Investing cash flowInv. cash
($48M)	($205M)	($12M)	$161M	$378M	($290M)	$383M	($122M)	($137M)	($860M)	—	Financing cash flowFin. cash
($46M)	($70M)	$29M	$62M	$69M	($58M)	$64M	($148M)	$1M	$61M	—	Change in cashΔ cash
											Balance sheet
$6.6B	$6.8B	$8.1B	$9.3B	$10.4B	$10.4B	$8.8B	$8.9B	$8.9B	$8.7B	$8.7B	Investments (total)Investments
$931M	$1.0B	$1.9B	$2.0B	$2.0B	$2.8B	$2.8B	$6.1B	$5.8B	$6.2B	$6.2B	Float (reserves)Float
$8.2B	$8.4B	$11.5B	$13.0B	$14.3B	$14.9B	$13.3B	$12.7B	$12.6B	$12.5B	$12.4B	Total assetsAssets
$6.2B	$6.3B	$8.5B	$9.0B	$9.8B	$10.9B	$10.6B	$10.2B	$9.8B	$9.8B	—	Total liabilitiesTotal liab.
—	—	—	—	—	—	$0	($200K)	($4M)	($12M)	—	Noncontrolling interestsNCI
$2.0B	$2.1B	$3.1B	$4.0B	$4.6B	$4.0B	$2.7B	$2.5B	$2.8B	$2.7B	$2.6B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
											Per share
51.2M	51.6M	58.8M	66.5M	66.7M	64.3M	63.8M	64.0M	64.8M	62.6M	58.7M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$0.33	$2.34	$3.24	$7.98	$6.14	$-1.92	$-4.49	$-4.25	$4.91	$2.29	$0.71	EPS (diluted)EPS
—	$4.41	$8.91	$7.54	$6.17	$4.56	$-3.78	$-2.94	$5.09	$8.85	$7.82	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$0.96	$0.96	$0.96	$1.02	$1.18	$1.25	$1.25	$1.25	$1.24	$1.27	$1.32	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$38.57	$41.02	$51.91	$59.69	$68.39	$62.36	$41.84	$39.13	$43.05	$42.83	$45.11	Book value / shareBVPS

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+5.0%/yr	−0.3%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+9.1%/yr (8-yr)	+7.5%/yr
EPS	+24.1%/yr	−17.9%/yr
Dividends / share	+3.2%/yr	+1.5%/yr
Capital spending / share	−4.2%/yr (8-yr)	−9.4%/yr
Book value / share	+1.2%/yr	−8.9%/yr

The year, in the company's words

the filing →

Verbatim from the 10-K's management discussion. Each sentence is shown only because its subject, direction, and stated figures check out against the filed numbers on this page. The words are the company's; the arithmetic is the record's.

Revenue+3.3%
“Revenues 2025 Compared with 2024 Total Revenues increased by $151.1 million to $4,789.7 million in 2025, compared to $4,638.6 million in 2024. The increase was primarily driven by higher earned premiums.”
✓ figure matches the filed record

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Is it a good business?

Combined ratio —

Not enough data

Industry peers: median 101%

What this means
Premiums or claims weren't found in the filing data.
Return on equity 5%

Below the cost of equity

Net income $143M ÷ equity $2.7B

Industry peers: median 10%

What this means
What it earns on shareholders' capital, the underwriting result plus what the float earns invested. Durably above the ~10% cost of equity is what compounds book value.

The float

Float $8.5B

3.2× equity

Net reserves + unearned premiums − prepaid reinsurance − receivables − DAC = $8.5B

What this means
Money held against future claims and invested in the meantime. Buffett's insight was that good underwriting makes this float cost less than nothing, a pool of other people's money the owners earn on. Basis note: net reserves derived as gross less recoverables; life-benefit reserves gross of their reinsurance. The larger it is against equity, the more that leverage works, for better or worse.
Investment income $405M

4.8% on the float

Net investment income $405M, 4.8% on the float

What this means
What the float and capital earned this year. This is the second engine: an insurer that breaks even on underwriting still wins if the float is large and invested well.

The cost and the reserves

Cost of float —

Not enough data

What this means
Needs the full float arithmetic and a cleanly tagged underwriting total; a partial figure would mislead.
Reserve development +$23M

Past reserves fell short

Prior-year development, FY2024: unfavorable (past years strengthened) · record: 4 favorable, 5 unfavorable of 9

What this means
Each year an insurer restates what its old accident years actually cost. Persistent favorable development means management reserved honestly and released the cushion; persistent unfavorable development means past profits were overstated by under-reserving — the industry's chronic sin, and the single most tell-tale line an owner can read. Signed as the company files it: negative favorable, positive unfavorable.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.

Fiscal year	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2021	$8.2M	−$1.2M	$293M
2022	$7.9M	$2.2M	($241M)
2023	$8.5M	$4.5M	($188M)
2024	$11.5M	$18.4M	$330M
2025	$3.1M	$1.2M	$554M
2025	$8.4M	−$5.1M	$554M

Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.

Insider ownership<1%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Income taxes as critical estimates
each rests partly on management's judgment; the filing's note sets out the assumptionsverify →

The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.

Peers, Insurance — Property & Casualty

The same industry, side by side on the underwriting lens. Each column names the period it is read over, and a median resting on fewer than three years carries that count beside it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each figure against.

Company	Revenuelatest FY, USD	Combined ratiomedian over the record	Loss ratiomedian over the record	Yield on floatmedian over the record	ROTCEmedian over the record
THGHanover Insurance Group	$6.6B	99%	64%	4.9%	13%
AXSAxis Capital Holdings Limited	$6.6B	101%	65%	—	7%
MCYMercury General	$6.0B	100%	75%	6.7%	10%
SIGISelective Insurance	$5.3B	97%	61%	6.0%	10%
KMPRKemper	$4.8B	—	78%3y	5.8%	9%
WTMWhite Mountains Insurance Group Ltd.	$3.7B	121%	60%1y	2.2%1y	15%
SPNTSiriusPoint Ltd.	$3.2B	111%	67%	3.5%	10%
PLGOPelagos Insurance Capital Limited	$2.5B	—	53%	5.1%	7%
Group median	—	—	65%	5.1%	10%

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

price / tangible book

An insurer is worth a multiple of its tangible book value, and the multiple it deserves is set by the return it earns on that book. Type today’s price; we show what you would be paying against what Kemper’s record justifies.

Today’s price $

The assumptions Cost of equity 10% Long-term growth 3%

Tangible book / share, delivered−17%/yr’20→’25

The justified multiple is (return on tangible equity − growth) ÷ (cost of equity − growth). An insurer earning exactly its cost of equity is worth about one times tangible book; the premium above that prices each point of durable excess return. A higher cost of equity lowers the justified multiple for an insurer.

Enter a price above to run it.

Price / tangible book—

Justified by the return—

Normalized return on tangible equity9%

Price / book—

Earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr avg ’23–’25)—

Graham’s price gate—

Graham applied the same standards to financial enterprises (Intelligent Investor ch.14): the 15× multiple cap on averaged earnings, and P/E times price-to-book at most 22.5. The gate marks the bargain-hunter’s floor, not a verdict.

Tangible book $1.2B on 59M shares, a 9% normalized return on it. The dials set the multiple such a return would justify; your price sets the multiple you are paying. It assumes the insurer keeps earning that return; an underwriting cycle, a reserve shortfall or a bad year on the float changes it, which is what the record and the 10-K are for.

Weigh KMPR against another business →

The owners of KMPR: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Kemper (KMPR), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/KMPR, data as of 2026-07-18.

Manual order: ← KMPB its page in the Manual KMT →

Industry order: ← KMPB the Insurance — Property & Casualty chapter KNSL →