Anusha Thavarajah, Regional Chief Executive Officer, Allianz Asia Pacific, said: “Amidst economic challenges in Asia's diverse and rapidly evolving markets, Allianz Asia Pacific has continuously pursued new milestones, capitalised on growth opportunities, and achieved solid increases in total revenues, operating profit, and new business value. In the first quarter of 2024, our sustained efforts following through a record FY2023 highlight the resilience and effective execution of Allianz Asia Pacific’s strategic initiatives across all markets.
We are pleased with the progress of Allianz Asia Pacific's distribution transformation program, which remains the cornerstone of the region's growth ambitions. Our Bancassurance channel witnessed double digit growth with Annualised Premium (ANP) up 19%2 and New Business Value (NBV) up 82%2 compared to 1Q 2023, driven by increased relationship manager activation, higher sales productivity, and customer-focused product steering.
The implementation of a region-wide bancassurance transformation has also significantly boosted business growth for key bank partnerships, with our HSBC partnership across Asia achieving a 6% increase in its active ratio and a 34% increase in productivity, surpassing financial targets in the first quarter.
Agency channel performance in 1Q 2024 saw a 3%2 increase in Annualised Premiums (ANP) and an increase of 13%2 in New Business Value (NBV). Industry headwinds in Indonesia persist, where sales and volumes were reported lower than in the previous year. Notwithstanding these effects, the ANP and NBV for the channel, excluding Indonesia, grew impressively by 22%2 and 31%2 respectively.
Our emphasis on professionalising our agency workforce has yielded remarkable results. Agency growth was driven by higher productivity levels, with ANP per active agent growing by 21%, bolstered by the strategic shift towards building a more professional salesforce.
Our Property & Casualty (P/C) business has seen remarkable growth in volume. With strategic initiatives focused on enhancing technical expertise in claims and churn management within our P/C retail and commercial insurance lines, we are confident in achieving a substantial improvement in our Combined Ratio (CoR).
As we enter the second quarter, we are optimistic about our growth path with many exciting developments in the pipeline. We will continue to forge ahead and are confident that our ongoing transformation strategy will deliver the right results for Allianz Asia Pacific.”
2 Growth vs p.y. is calculated on a constant currency basis
