Top Workers’ Comp Story of 2019: Berkshire Hathaway’s Sale of Applied Underwriters

January 2, 2020

The news that Berkshire Hathaway was in talks to sell its workers’ compensation unit, Applied Underwriters, caught readers’ attention in February and was easily Insurance Journal’s biggest workers’ compensation story of the year then and as the deal played out. A deal happened in October, when Applied Underwriters was sold back to its original founder for $920 million. In-between, there were reviews of the deal by state regulators, a move of the carrier from California to New Mexico, and a series of complaints by California authorities over the transactions. Insurance Journal covered the deal from start to finish: