ICICI Prudential Life Insurance reported a quarterly profit rise on Tuesday, as it benefited from an increased push into non-market-linked products and lower expenses.
Shares of the company rose as much as 3% after the results and were last up 1.3% against a 0.2% drop in the benchmark Nifty 50.
Life insurers in the world’s most populous country have been focusing on diversifying their product mix as volatile equity markets and uncertain macroeconomic conditions dampen demand for market-linked insurance.
While demand for these has recovered in recent months amid a recovery in the equity markets, insurers have been pushing more traditional, non-linked products that offer higher margins.
ICICI Pru Life Q2 Details
For ICICI Prudential Life, non-linked products made up 21.8% of the product mix at the end of September from 18.1% a year earlier.
Contributions from market-linked products fell to 48.1% as of September-end from 51.6% a year earlier.
Its net premium income rose 10% year-over-year to 118.43 billion rupees ($1.33 billion) during the quarter, pushing its standalone profit up by 19% to 2.99 billion rupees.
Operating expenses declined 17% on lower advertising and employee-related costs.
Its value of new business for the quarter rose to 5.92 billion rupees from 5.86 billion rupees a year earlier, as per Reuters’ calculation.
The value of new business margin for the half year ended September 30 was at 24.5%, up from 23.7% a year earlier.
However, the annualised premium equivalent, a key gauge of new business for insurers, stood at 24.22 billion rupees, down from 25.04 billion rupees a year earlier.
Listed peers SBI Life Insurance and HDFC Life Insurance have yet to report their second quarter results.
