ING Life: Flat premiums and profit in Q2

ING Life, the leader of the local life insurance market, came to a standstill in business and in underlying profit before tax, in the second quarter of 2008, with EUR 37 million gross written premiums and a EUR 2 million operational profit, according to the results published by ING Group yesterday. After the first half of the year, the Romanian insurer has grown with only 4% as compared to H1/2007, from EUR 71 million to EUR 74 million, while the operational profit has dropped down to EUR 3 million, from EUR 4 million, the group announces.
According to the statements made by Cornelia COMAN, the interim General Manager of ING Life, the gross premiums written by the company have grown, in national currency, with 15%, up to RON 272 million, in the first semester of 2008, from RON 236 million, registered in the 2007 similar period of time. 

Also, ING Life obtained a 19% growth of the gross profit, from RON 16 million, reported in S1/2007, to RON 19 million, whereas ING Pensions Fund registered a RON 11.2 million loss, the interim leader of ING Life Insurance declared, for the XPRIMM Insurance Newsletters.
In the Central and Eastern Europe, the life insurance business of ING have grown with 16% in the first half, up to EUR 725 million, so that the Romanian operations have grown for times slower than the regional medium value. Also, the gross income of ING in the region has grown with approximately 7%, from EUR 151 million to EUR 162 million, according to the results given by the group. 

Romania is the fifth market in importance among the ING life insurances operations in CEE, after Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, surpassing only Bulgaria.
On the local life insurance market, ING holds the first place, with a market share of 30.5% (in the first quarter of the year, compared to 43.7% in 2007). In the mandatory private pensions' activity, ING Pensions has a market share of almost 40% with EUR 80 million assets at the end of July and 33.2% out of the total number of participants, while in the voluntary pensions activity ING Life has recently gained the first place, as far the number of clients and the net assets are concerned, with a 33.8% market share for assets and with 40% of the number of total participants.