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At first glance, an investor might think that Trisura Group is a young, fast-growing specialty insurer. It debuted on the Toronto Stock Exchange in 2017, and it’s now roughly 10 times as big as it was then.
But the company has a much longer pedigree. It was spun out of Brookfield Corp.’s private equity platform and dates back to 2006, when several former executives of London Life launched a new entity. Trisura focuses on surety bonds, specialized insurance for corporations such as errors and omissions, and directors and officers coverage, plus niches such as warrantees and more.
David Clare, 40, was named president and CEO in 2018, after earlier jobs at giants Power Corp. and Brookfield. “The hope was that we could take a relatively small entity and grow it profitably—always sticking to our knitting in the specialty insurance vertical.”
After debuting as a largely Canadian player, Trisura is expanding in the United States. One key acquisition was New Jersey–based First Founders Assurance Co. for US$18 million in 2024. That solidified Trisura’s foothold in the U.S. surety market and expanded its licensing to all 50 states.
Over time, including the original spin-out in 2017, Trisura has raised more than $300 million in equity markets. Brookfield has sold off most of its holdings, and Trisura is now widely held, most of the owners being Canadian.
For individual investors, though, assessing Trisura takes some work. It’s hard to find comparable companies in Canada, and in some lines of business, it competes against global giants such as Travelers, Aviva and Chubb.
Clare urges investors to keep their eye on two key metrics. One is Trisura’s book value per share, which has grown from $4.59 at the end of 2017 to $19.42 at the end of last year. “The natural corollary is that market value should follow,” he says.
Another is Trisura’s combined ratio, which is how much it spends on claims and expenses compared to how much it earns in premiums. A ratio under 100% is good—an insurer is taking in more than it’s paying out. Trisura’s ratio for 2025 was a stellar 84.9%.
Despite its rapid growth, Clare says he still thinks of Trisura as a “small cap” — with 500 employees and a stock market value of about $2 billion. How big can it get? “There’s a long runway for us to keep growing in the areas that we’ve identified,” he says.