Sun Life premium income seen hitting target

MANILA, Philippines - Sun Life of Canada Philippine Inc. (Sun Life) expects its premium income to hit its full year growth target on the back of strong third quarter performance.

Sun Life president and chief executive officer Rizalina G. Mantaring said the third quarter results were better than last year’s results.

“Fourth quarter trending looks even better,” Mantaring said.

Sun Life is confident that its new business or first year premiums will hit growth targets on account of a 40-percent growth in its regular pay business. Regular pay business accounts for 80 percent of Sun Life’s traditional and variable premiums.

Sun Life recorded total premiums last year of P29.6 billion. Since 2011, premiums have been growing by roughly 40 percent. First year premiums amounted to P2.9 billion but single premiums reached over P16 billion.

Based on data from the Insurance Commission (IC), the life insurance sector took a heavy beating in terms of total premium income as the dominant single-pay premiums went down. From P95.7 billion in the first semester of 2013, it plummeted 30.92 percent to P66.1 billion this year.

Sun Life’s net income contracted to P6.9 billion this year, seven percent lower than the P7.4 billion in the first semester of 2013.

However, both assets and paid up capital reflected gains of 12.18 percent and 18.17 percent, respectively.

Total assets expanded from P706.6 billion last year to P792.6 billion. Paid-up capital rose to P14.2 billion as of end-June from P12 billion in the same period last year.