Newcomer Flagstone Reinsurance Holdings achieved a profit of $35.6 million in the first quarter of 2007.

The company was set up in 2005 and made its initial public offering on April 1 this year raising $175.5 million.

During the opening three months of this year it suffered a $25.4m loss from European windstorm Kyrill in January and $6.9m of exposure from a space satellite loss.

But these loses hardly impacted Flagstone Re's property catastrophe reinsurance and insurance business. As a result of its IPO it has a market capitalisation of $1.1 billion. It wrote gross premiums of $207m compared to $88.6m in the same period a year ago.

By comparison the company's profit in the opening quarter of 2006 was just $5.8m.

The success of the opening quarter equals a diluted book value per share of $12.31, up 3.1 percent for the quarter, and the net income per share is $0.49.

"We had a strong first quarter. Competition increased in geographies and lines of business not exposed to peak natural perils, but we have remained committed to maintaining the highest standards of underwriting discipline, we continue to be strategically and financially well placed to select the best opportunities in all areas," said chief executive officer David Brown.

"While our Q1 2007 writings were considerably larger than Q1 2006, we focus much more on the quality and margin of business rather than the volume of premiums written.

"We experienced limited exposure to Kyrill and recorded a related gross reserve of $29.3 million despite UK and Europe Wind being our single largest risk on an exposure basis at that point in time."

Chairman Mark Byrne said: "We regard the increase in diluted book value per share, measured over intervals of three years, as the best single measure of our performance for shareholders. For the three months ended March 31, the increase represents an annualised growth since the founding of the Company of 18.1 percent.

"Since our reinsurance book is exposed to catastrophes, our future results will not be smooth from quarter to quarter. For this reason, we will not engage in the practice of providing forward earnings guidance. We are committed to seeking (and are currently finding) opportunities to deploy our capital at attractive expected returns while maintaining a disciplined underwriting approach."