ING Life shifts focus to participating policies

Chief executive officer Ignacio Aguilar said yesterday that market volatility and lower returns from the bond market were challenges for the company to maintain its return on investment because almost of its investment portfolio is in government bonds.

The company will not reshuffle its portfolio because government bonds are a long-term investment and ensure the CAR.

The company lifted its CAR to 200 per cent in the third quarter of last year, which is above the 150-per-cent minimum required by the Insurance Commission. The company has revised its product strategy by selling participating policies to reduce risks from the guaranteed return of normal products.

The company will also add features to its products to capture life-cycle customers and promote health insurance because people have become more careful about their health.

Growth projection

ING this year projects its total first-year premiums to grow by 39 per cent from Bt2.21 billion.

First-year premiums this year will rely on two key channels – bancassurance and agencies.

TMB Bank is ING Life’s bancassurance partner. The company will capture TMB’s borrowers in the small and medium-sized enterprise segment and offer mortgage-reducing term assurance to the bank’s home-loan customers.

First-year premiums from bancassurance last year were Bt1.45 billion, while first-year premiums from agencies were Bt632 million and from direct marketing Bt130 million.

However, total first-year premiums last year dropped by 7 per cent because of the heavy flooding.

The growth of bancassurance helped gross premiums last year to rise slightly by 9 per cent to Bt10.23 billion.

KP Tan, chief agency officer, said that to improve sales, the company would stress the quality of agents more than quantity. The agency channel this year is expected to generate first-year premiums of Bt1 billion compared with Bt632 million last year.