Insurance sector: net financial result up by 3.5% y-o-y in Q1-Q3

2009-12-21



The net financial result of the insurance sector in the first three quarters of the year amounted to just over PLN 5.8bn (approx. €1.3bn), which translates into an increase of 3.5% y-o-y, according to the Central Statistical Office (GUS).
The improvement in the sector’s overall result was thanks to an almost 51% y-o-y growth in the net result of life insurance firms compared with a year earlier, to nearly PLN 3.3bn (€746m). By contrast, non-life insurers saw their net result decline by more than 26% y-o-y in Q1-Q3, to just over PLN 2.5bn (€581m). Consequently, the net profit margin of the life sector surged to 10.8% from 5.7%, whereas the margin of the non-life sector dropped to 14.3% from 20.6%. Even so, the net profit margin of the insurance sector as a whole improved by almost two points to 12.1% from 10.2%.
At the end of September, insurance companies operating in Poland had assets worth a total of PLN 144.4bn (€33bn), which was 3.1% higher than a year earlier. The growth in assets was generated by non-life insurers (up by 11.1% y-o-y), as the total value of assets of life insurers fell by 1.6% y-o-y.
Of the 30 life insurance firms present on the market at the end of Q3, 20 reported a net profit. The number of profit-making non-life insurers was 24, out of a total of 35.