It seems to me that Combs is a bit of "Jack of all trades" . At one point he was also the main BRK man in the "Health care project JV with Amazon and JPM". He is either a superman or ...tries desperately to find a role for himself at Berkshire. Perhaps Warren got it slightly wrong on this one.
With Joe Brandon returning to Berkshire, perhaps some of the burden of overseeing GEICO can be assigned to Brandon allowing Combs to return to a portfolio management role.
Good point. Still Allegheny is not focused on the Auto Insurance Market and I suspect the Brandon is more likely to take over from Ajit. The few times I saw Ajit on video, I had the impression, perhaps wrongly so, that he was not very well or in great shape.
Todd Combs has been the interim CEO of GEICO for the past 2 years now. Is this position permanent? Did GEICO ever formally look for an auto insurance expert as part of a CEO search? If so, why has no executive been hired? Todd has a lot on his plate between GEICO and managing a $20B equity portfolio.
His profile on the GEICO website makes the job seem permanent. But it’s somewhat confusing. I’m the first paragraph, it implies that the portfolio management role was a prior job (“had managed”). In the third paragraph, it indicates that he retains his portfolio management role, which we know based on many comments made by Warren Buffett.
These are both demanding full time jobs, obviously.
Apparently GEICO has closed its insurance office in California. They are still writing policies in the state, but through direct channels (meaning that customers can continue to use the GEICO website and mobile app to get quotes and purchase policies). The action resulted in significant layoffs.
As I mentioned in the article, GEICO's expense ratio is very low and while that has muted the negative impact of recent difficulties, reducing advertising and employee costs could have longer-run implications. So it is a concern. I rarely wish for quarterly conference calls when it comes to Berkshire, but it would be nice to have some answers on this situation before next year's annual meeting.
It seems to me that Combs is a bit of "Jack of all trades" . At one point he was also the main BRK man in the "Health care project JV with Amazon and JPM". He is either a superman or ...tries desperately to find a role for himself at Berkshire. Perhaps Warren got it slightly wrong on this one.
With Joe Brandon returning to Berkshire, perhaps some of the burden of overseeing GEICO can be assigned to Brandon allowing Combs to return to a portfolio management role.
Kingswell wrote about this today: https://kingswell.substack.com/p/joe-brandons-triumphant-return-to
Good point. Still Allegheny is not focused on the Auto Insurance Market and I suspect the Brandon is more likely to take over from Ajit. The few times I saw Ajit on video, I had the impression, perhaps wrongly so, that he was not very well or in great shape.
He seemed fine at the latest annual meeting. In general we need to see Jain and Abel get more airtime during the meetings.
Todd Combs has been the interim CEO of GEICO for the past 2 years now. Is this position permanent? Did GEICO ever formally look for an auto insurance expert as part of a CEO search? If so, why has no executive been hired? Todd has a lot on his plate between GEICO and managing a $20B equity portfolio.
His profile on the GEICO website makes the job seem permanent. But it’s somewhat confusing. I’m the first paragraph, it implies that the portfolio management role was a prior job (“had managed”). In the third paragraph, it indicates that he retains his portfolio management role, which we know based on many comments made by Warren Buffett.
These are both demanding full time jobs, obviously.
https://careers.geico.com/us/en/blogarticle/meet-our-ceo-todd-combs
Very interesting. Thank you for pointing that out. Seems like a question for the next annual meeting frankly. At a minimum this is sloppy grammar...
Apparently GEICO has closed its insurance office in California. They are still writing policies in the state, but through direct channels (meaning that customers can continue to use the GEICO website and mobile app to get quotes and purchase policies). The action resulted in significant layoffs.
Sacramento Bee Article:
https://www.sacbee.com/news/california/article263946861.html
As I mentioned in the article, GEICO's expense ratio is very low and while that has muted the negative impact of recent difficulties, reducing advertising and employee costs could have longer-run implications. So it is a concern. I rarely wish for quarterly conference calls when it comes to Berkshire, but it would be nice to have some answers on this situation before next year's annual meeting.