Securities Times reporter Deng Xiongying
Recently, listed insurance companies have disclosed premium data for January 2022.
Six listed insurance companies including China Life, PICC, Ping An, China Pacific Insurance, Xinhua Insurance, and Guohua Life (Tianmao Group) achieved a total of 580.4 billion yuan in original insurance premium income, a year-on-year increase of 2.4%.
Specifically, in January 2022, China Life achieved original insurance premium income of 207.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 5.34%; PICC realized original insurance premium income of 115.512 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 17.89%; China Ping An achieved original insurance premium income of 136.486 billion yuan Yuan, a year-on-year increase of 1.21%; China Pacific Insurance (life insurance and property insurance business) achieved original insurance premium income of 76.895 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.29%; New China Insurance achieved original insurance premium income of 35.868 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.57%; Guohua Life achieved The original insurance premium income was 8.458 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 59.68%.
Large insurance companies have always been the bellwether of the industry's transformation achievements.
Judging from the life insurance business performance disclosed by listed companies, the industry is differentiated, and the overall situation is still under pressure.
For example, China Life, which has been the industry leader in terms of its life insurance premiums, saw its premiums drop by 5.34% year-on-year in January this year, and its premium income for the whole of last year increased slightly by 1.16% year-on-year.
The premium income of Ping An Life and CPIC Life, which have always been at the forefront of the industry, decreased slightly by 0.62% and 1.1% year-on-year respectively.
The life insurance and health insurance businesses of PICC are differentiated. The original insurance premium income of PICC Life Insurance and PICC Health Insurance was 46.619 billion yuan and 8.461 billion yuan respectively, with year-on-year changes of 30.16% and -6.56% respectively.
Among listed companies, New China Insurance achieved original insurance premium income of 35.868 billion yuan in January, a year-on-year increase of 3.57%.
In addition, Guohua Life achieved original insurance premium income of 8.458 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 59.68%.
It is understood that the substantial increase in the performance of Guohua Life Insurance has a certain relationship with its small scale and the low performance base in the same period in 2021.
In January 2021, Guohua Life achieved original insurance premium income of 5.297 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 5.6%.
In terms of property insurance, the momentum of continuous recovery is obvious.
In January this year, PICC P&C achieved premium income of 60.432 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 13.8%, of which auto insurance premiums increased by 14.5%, and accident and health insurance, agricultural insurance, and liability insurance all achieved growth of more than 15%.
The monthly premium growth rate of PICC P&C auto insurance has slowed down, and even negative growth has occurred for several months. It has continued to increase significantly since November 2021, helping the company's overall premium growth rate to pick up.
The property and casualty business of Ping An Property & Casualty and CPIC also showed strong growth.
In January this year, CPIC P&C business (including CPIC P&C and CPIC Credit Rural Insurance) achieved original insurance business income of 21.011 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.7%.
Along with the differentiation of performance, driven by factors such as the improvement of the epidemic and the rise in interest rates, insurance stocks have ushered in a rare rebound this year.
In response to the recent rebound in the insurance sector, Cinda Securities believes that the current insurance sector is at the bottom of its historical valuation, the short-term positive is the improvement of the epidemic, and the increase in the activity rate of agents has formed a positive pull on premiums; the strong expectation of the stable growth policy has brought interest rates to stabilize and rise; Real estate risks were mitigated, and the investment side of insurance companies improved.
In the long run, there is still great pressure on the debt side, and the turning point needs further observation.
The agency also believes that there is no clear inflection point on the insurance liability side.
The performance of the liability side is the focus of the recovery of the insurance sector.
Many analysts believe that the effect of the transformation of the agent team is difficult to show in the short term, but there is also a certain motivation.
For example, under the background of falling interest rates, the new regulations on asset management will break the rigid exchange rate, and the advantages of insurance products to guarantee interest rates will appear.