Munich Re promised to return more than 8 billion euros ($10.9 billion) to its shareholders by the end of 2010, answering criticism it was not doing enough to drive up its stock price.
The world's second-biggest reinsurer made the commitment on Friday on the back of a stronger-than-expected first-quarter net profit of 982 million euros. The result was helped by investment gains that partly offset losses from European winter storm Kyrill, which pushed the company into loss on underwriting in the quarter.
As a first step in the capital return programme, Munich Re said it would buy back up to 2 billion euros in shares or about 6.75 percent of its share capital at current prices by April 2008, with a further 3 billion planned by the end of 2010.