Ceylinco Life ends 2015 as country’s No 1 life insurer for 12th successive year

Ceylinco Life has ended 2015 on a characteristically strong note with a total income of Rs.19.89 billion, of which the premium income accounted for Rs.13.4 billion, keeping the company at the helm of the life insurance industry for the 12th consecutive year.

The life insurance market leader reports that the total income for the 12 months ending December 31, 2015 was up 7 percent over 2014, while the gross written premium improved by a noteworthy 12.16 percent.

The company recorded a net profit of Rs.2.060 billion for the year and transferred Rs.1.8 billion to the shareholders. Investment and other income remained flat at Rs.6.74 billion, an unsurprising result given the interest rates in effect, the company said. However, Ceylinco Life’s investment portfolio increased by a robust 17.35 percent in value terms to Rs.67.1 billion, while the total assets grew by a noteworthy Rs.9.1 billion or 12.9 percent to Rs.80.2 billion for the review period.

The company’s Life Fund posted a net growth of Rs.7.99 billion or 13.31 percent to reach Rs.68.01 billion at end-2015. Ceylinco Life was the fastest company in the local life insurance industry to reach a Life Fund of Rs.60 billion, a feat it achieved in 2014.

“We are happy with these results, particularly because they were achieved in a year of unusual challenges, which we were able to overcome without losing our focus on operational performance,” Ceylinco Life Managing Director and CEO Rajkumar Renganathan commented. 
“Our 2015 results can be viewed as a measure of the company’s strength and resilience and its unwavering attention to business fundamentals.”

Ceylinco Life sold 170,007 new policies in 2015 averaging 14,166 a month, which is satisfactory in the context of the conditions that prevailed, particularly the continuing pressure on disposable incomes in many of the target policyholder segments, the company said. Sales of retirement plans grew by 30 percent in the 12 months reviewed.

Benefits to the policyholders totalled Rs.5.9 billion in 2015, a 21.7 percent improvement over the previous year. This included ‘Avurudu cash’ bonuses to more than 14,000 policyholders apart from the Rs.2.9 billion in annual bonuses declared. The annual bonus pay-out in 2015 was the highest in Ceylinco Life’s history and surpassed the previous year’s by Rs.500 million. 

At end-2015, Ceylinco Life’s investment portfolio comprised of government securities (53 percent), licensed private banks (18 percent), state banks (2 percent), real estate (7 percent), corporate debt (19 percent) and others (1 percent). These investments are made in conformity with the investment guidelines stipulated under the Regulation of the Insurance Industry Act No 43 of 2000 and are subject to regular monitoring by the Insurance Board of Sri 
Lanka (IBSL).

In other key performance indicators, Ceylinco Life maintained its solvency ratio (admissible assets over total liabilities) at eight times the legal requirement. The solvency margin is one of the most important key performance indicators for a life insurance business because it represents a company’s ability to meet the obligations arising from its life insurance contracts. The prevailing insurance regulations require insurance companies to maintain a solvency margin of not less than 5 percent of their statutory liabilities at all times.