Shares of insurer Allstate fall after 3rd-qtr miss

* Allstate shrs fall after earnings miss

* Miss stems from higher catastrophe losses than expected

NEW YORK, Nov 5 (Reuters) - Shares of insurer Allstate Corp (ALL.N) declined 4 percent on Thursday, a day after the company reported third-quarter results that improved from a year before but fell short of analysts' expectations.

"Underwriting was slightly worse than we expected in the third quarter and net investment income was slightly lower than we expected," said Sandler O'Neill analyst Paul Newsome, in a note to investors.

Allstate's third-quarter profit had been widely expected to improve from a year before, when $1.8 billion in claims from catastrophes, including hurricanes Gustav and Ike, left a hole in the insurer's results. And while catastrophe losses were much lower this year, they were not as low as analysts had forecast.

In the latest quarter, catastrophe losses fell to $407 million.

Allstate's third-quarter operating earnings of 99 cents a share, compared with a loss of 35 cents a share a year earlier, missed analysts' average forecast of $1.01 a share. The shares of the Northbrook, Illinois-based insurer fell 4 percent, or $1.20, to $28.42 in morning trade on the New York Stock Exchange.

(Reporting by Lilla Zuill, editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

((lilla.zuill@thomsonreuters.com;+1 646 223 6281)) Keywords: ALLSTATE/

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