Indian life insurance cos lowering their growth estimates

Here is a verbatim transcript of Avni Raja's comments on CNBC-TV18. Also watch the accompanying video.

 

After being hit by the current market conditions and registering a degrowth of 5% as of August this year, the life insurance industry in India is lowering its their growth expectations not only that- the valuations of these companies have also been hit. That's according to an Enam research report.

 

There has been a substantial slowdown in the life insurance sector, Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) has seen a degrowth of 29% and LIC's market share has fallen to 38% and that is not all. The report says the valuations of the companies have also been hit.

 

According to an earlier Enam report of the top Life Insurance Companies ICICI Prudential was valued at USD 8.3 billion as of July this year but now it is valued at only USD 5.8 billion. Similarly HDFC's Standard Life valuations has fallen from USD 3.4 to 2.4 billion and Reliance Life has fallen from USD 3.2 to 2.3 billion.

 

 The private sector has also registered a growth rate of 56%, which is lower than 66% last month. The report says that a further slowdown is expected. ICICI Prudential and HDFC Standard Life have also slowed down growing only at about 30-40%. Bajaj Allianz has seen a sharp slow down and has been growing only at about 6%. On the other hand SBI Life Insurance Company Ltd (SBI Life), Reliance Life and Birla Sun Life have all seen a strong growth rate of over 100%.