SINGAPORE (Feb 13): Great Eastern Holdings reported a 96% increase in FY17 earnings to $1.16 billion after 4Q earnings more than doubled to $423.6 million from a year ago.
The insurance group says higher operating and non-operating profit, as well as higher investment profits from shareholders’ funds were responsible for its full-year bottomline surpassing the $1 billion mark.
Total weighted new sales (TWNS) and new business embedded value (NBEV) registered robust growth for 4Q and FY17. In 4Q, TWNS rose 36% to $471.7 million while NBEV rose 35% to $204.4 million. On a full year basis, TWNS rose by 23%, driven by increased contributions from Singapore across both agency and bancassurance channels. NBEV, a measure of long-term economic profitability, NBEV registered a strong 17% growth in FY17 over FY16, driven by higher sales.
In Singapore, TWNS grew 36% for the full year. Agency sales grew 109% for the fourth quarter and 51% for the full year. In Malaysia, NBEV registered a 37% growth over the course of the year, generated by its agency salesforce whose recruitment strategy attracted about 5,200 new representatives.
In 4Q and FY17, gross premiums increased 61% and 31% to $4.3 billion and $12.6 billion from a year ago.
Profit from insurance business for 4Q was $265.3 million, up 79% from the same quarter last year, mainly because of higher contribution from its Singapore business and gain in its investments due to favourable financial market conditions compared to last year.
For FY17, profit from insurance business increased by 72% to $899.9 million for the same reasons.
Fees and other income increased to $23.7 million for 4Q and $88.5 million for FY17 from higher fee income from the group’s asset management arm, Lion Global Investors.
Khor Hock Seng, Group CEO of Great Eastern, says, "As the market leader in Singapore and Malaysia, we will continue to improve customer experience and deliver innovative services and products. The good progress we have made in digital transformation will take us to the next level in our customer service delivery."
In its results filings, Great Eastern made no mention of the likely sale of a stake in its Malaysian unit to satisfy central bank requirements.
See: Great Eastern in talks with Malaysia's largest pension fund
Great Eastern's board of directors have recommended the payment of a final dividend of 50 cents per share plus a special dividend of 10 cents per share.
Shares in Great Eastern closed 14 cents higher at $29.00 on Monday.
