Rubbish Check
Forbes Business · August 10, 2026
source“Geico Earnings Plummet 45% In Hit To Berkshire Hathaway’s Insurance Business”
R2/ 10
Lightly altered
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
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In short
Rubbish Talk rates Forbes' claim that Geico's earnings "plummeted 45%" a 2/10 because the figure matches Berkshire's own SEC filing exactly, with only a minor stretch in labelling it a hit to the whole "insurance business" when other Berkshire insurers grew that quarter.
The Verdict
Lightly altered. The 45% decline is the real, filed number and the article correctly attributes it to a genuine operational deterioration, not a weather event, but the headline's leap from "Geico" to "Berkshire Hathaway's insurance business" glosses over the fact that Berkshire's Primary Group and reinsurance units both improved in the same quarter.
What actually happened
Berkshire Hathaway's second-quarter SEC filing showed Geico's pre-tax underwriting earnings falling to $994 million from $1.82 billion a year earlier, a decline other outlets independently confirm as 45.4%. Rising bodily injury claim frequency and severity, not catastrophe losses, drove the drop. Berkshire's total insurance underwriting earnings also declined, but by a much smaller 13-14%, because gains elsewhere in the insurance segment partly offset Geico's slide.
Key facts
- Geico pre-tax underwriting earnings: $994 million in Q2 2026 vs $1.82 billion in Q2 2025, a 45.4% drop, confirmed by an independent trade-press readout of the same filing: "Geico pre-tax UW earnings decline 45.4% YoY to $994 million."
- Geico's loss ratio rose to 76.6% in Q2 2026, up nearly five points year over year, per the article's read of the filing.
- Berkshire's total insurance underwriting earnings fell 13-14% (to roughly $1.73-2.18 billion depending on the reporting window), a smaller drop than Geico's alone, because Primary Group underwriting earnings rose 333% to $273 million and reinsurance rose 8.9% to $1.14 billion in the same quarter, per independent trade coverage.
- No catastrophe losses hit Geico in H1 2026, making the deterioration operational rather than weather-driven, as the article itself notes.
What to watch for
Watch whether Geico's combined ratio (91.2% this quarter, up 7.7 points) keeps deteriorating or stabilises as rate increases catch up with rising bodily-injury severity. Also watch whether other outlets' next-quarter coverage separates Geico's auto-specific pain from the rest of Berkshire's insurance book, which is currently performing well.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
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