Generali posts best profit in eight years

Italian insurance company Generali experienced its best profit in eight years in 2015, posting a net income of €2.03 billion, up 21.6 percent from a net income of €1.67 billion in 2014. The increase came thank to improvement in the firm’s operating and non-operating performance, thus returning to pre-financial crisis levels. The Group’s operating result reached €4.8 billion, up 6.1 percent from 2014’s €4.5 billion, driven in particular by the firm’s property/casualty (P/C) segment and thanks to a solid result of its life segment, in spite of volatile financial markets.  Generali’s operating return on equity (RoE), the main profitability target, consequently reached 14 percent, an increase compared to 13.2 percent in 2014), exceeding the firm’s goal of remaining above 13 percent.  In the P&C segment, premiums grew by 0.8 percent to € 20.9 billion (€ 20.6 billion FY14), through the growth of both the non-motor line and the steady performance of the motor line, which experienced varied performance in the different countries where the Group operates because of the strong competitive pressures.  The P&C business confirmed its very strong technical profitability, with an improved combined ratio of 93.1 percent, an improvement of 0.6 percent, thanks to the decline of the loss ratio, in spite of the greater impact of catastrophic claims of €75 million. Thanks to the good performance in all business lines, life premium income reached €53.3 billion, an increase of 6.2 percent from 2014’s €49.8 billion. Unit linked contracts continued to increase (+8.6 percent), consistently with the strategy of promoting insurance products with low capital absorption, while protection policy products performed very well, increasing by 11.8 percent, as did the savings policies, with 3.7 percent growth. Gabriele Galateri di Genola, chairman of Generali, said: “The positive result for 2015 shows the quality of the turnaround plan accomplished by the company over the last few years and of the new strategy launched last year.  “These results allow us to propose at the Shareholders’ Meeting a dividend per share of 0.72 up by 20 percent compared to 2015. This is an excellent start to a new phase beginning with the appointment of Philippe Donnet as new group chief executive officer.”