General insurers posted a 20.82 percent growth in premium collection at Rs. 77,884 crore during the four-month period-till July- as against a 23 percent growth at Rs. 54,492 crore in the three-month period ended June 2022.

After de growing in June, state owned National Insurance Company(NIC) has grown its premium by almost 32 per cent year on year (Y-OY)to Rs 1,486.79 in July

Similarly, Oriental Insurance Company(OIC) has expanded its premium by 52 per cent y-o-y to Rs 1772.26 crore in July. It had a 18.4 per cent premium growth in June

Mumbai:

With a huge push from the regulator IRDAI, some of the general insurers including three financially weak public sector general insurers, seem to be biting the bullets to expand their topline starting from July.

After de-growing in June, state owned National Insurance Company(NIC) has grown its premium by almost 32 per cent year on year (Y-OY)to Rs 1,486.79 in July.

Similarly, Oriental Insurance Company(OIC) has expanded its premium by 52 per cent y-o-y to Rs 1772.26 crore in July. It had a 18.4 per cent premium growth in June.

United India Insurance(UII) after growing its premium by 16 per cent in June, has seen its premium surging by 28 per cent y-o-y to Rs 1800 crore in July.

From the private sector stable, ICICI Lombard General Insurance, which grew by 54 per cent in June, has grown its premium by 66 per cent y-o-y to Rs 1960 crore in July. The market share of ICICI Lombard General Insurance also increased to 9.41 percent this year as compared to 7.62 percent last year.

Tata AIG General Insurance, which posted a growth of 36 per cent in June, has grown by 48 per cent y-o-o to Rs 1154 crore in July.

Other smaller companies like Kotak General Insurance, Go Digit, ACKO, Edelweiss, Niva bupa health insurance Aditya Birla Health Insurance, Care Health Insurance and Manipal Cigna Health Insurance have continued their high growth momentum in monthly premium mobilisation.

The IRDAI, under its new chairman Debasish Panda, in the second conclave of industry CEOs, recently had proposed a big hike in the premium collection target in the next five years to deepen insurance penetration in the country.

Panda proposed that the premium collection which was at Rs 2.20 lakh crore in FY2022 could be increased to Rs 2.98 lakh crore in FY2023. He has set a much higher target of Rs 11.73 lakh crore by FY2027, a rise of 433 per cent, for the industry.

Together, four PSU general insurers, New India Assurance (NIA), OIC, UII, NIC have grown by 25 per cent year on year(Y-o-Y) to Rs 8049 crore in the month of July and have further shed over 2 per cent of market share to the private sector companies during the month.

In fact, NIA, the country’s largest general insurer which used to grow rapidly earlier has slowed down while the other three others have seen a spurt in their premium collection in July.

NIA, that has preferred to grow in single digit, reported only an 8.39 percent growth in premium collection at Rs 12,539 crore during the four-month period ended July 2022.
The PSU insurer’s market share also declined to 16.10 percent as of July 2022 as against 17.95 percent in the previous year.

However analysts pointed out that the general insurance companies have reported a lower growth in premium mobilization during the four-month period ended July 2022 amid the rise in inflation and interest rates in the country.

General insurers posted a 20.82 percent growth in premium collection at Rs. 77,884 crore during the four-month period as against a 23 percent growth at Rs. 54,492 crore in the three-month period ended June 2022.

Similarly, the non-life industry showed a growth of 16.05 percent at Rs. 23,392 core in the month of July 2022 as against a growth of 20.68 percent growth at Rs. 17,810 crore in the month of June 2022, according to figures compiled by the General Insurance Council (GIC).

According to observers, the decline in growth is due to rising inflation and the Reserve Bank decision to increase interest rate to tame the price rise.
Further, the decline in the performance of public sector NIA also impacted the overall growth in premium collection.

Standalone health insurance companies also showed lower growth of 27.13 percent at Rs. 7,411 crore during the four-month ended July 2022 as against a growth of 28.63 percent at Rs. 5,263 crore in premium collection during the three-month period ended June 2022.

The IRDAI, under its new chairman Debasish Panda, in the second conclave of industry CEOs, recently had proposed a big hike in the premium collection target in the next five years to deepen insurance penetration in the country.

Panda proposed that the premium collection which was at Rs 2.20 lakh crore in the year FY2022 could be increased to Rs 2.98 lakh crore in FY2023. He had set a much higher target of Rs 11.73 lakh crore by FY2027, a rise of 433 per cent, for the industry.