The Office of the Commissioner of Insurance (OCI) today (September 30) released the Hong Kong insurance business statistics for 2015 with reference to the audited returns and actuarial information submitted by insurers.

     In 2015, the total gross premiums of the Hong Kong insurance industry increased by 10.3 per cent to $374.1 billion.

     For long-term insurance business, the office premiums of new Individual Life business increased by 17.6 per cent to $128.1 billion in 2015 when compared with 2014. New office premiums for Individual Life (Non-Linked) business increased by 26.9 per cent to $117.8 billion. On the other hand, Individual Life (Linked) business dropped by 36 per cent to $10.3 billion in terms of new office premiums. The total number of new policies increased by 12.3 per cent to 1,168,123 in 2015.

     For in-force business, the total office premiums increased by 11 per cent from $295.7 billion in 2014 to $328.1 billion. The Individual Life category remained the dominant line of business, making up $309.3 billion or 94.3 per cent of the total business. The number of policies in 2015 stood at 11.4 million, carrying net liabilities of $1,293 billion. Yearly contributions for Retirement Scheme contracts administered by insurers decreased by 1.5 per cent to $7.8 billion. There were 52,779 Retirement Scheme contracts carrying net liabilities of $105.8 billion. The in-force office premiums of Group Life business increased by 8.3 per cent to $3.2 billion, carrying net liabilities of $1.1 billion. The in-force office premiums of Annuity and Other businesses (comprising mainly Permanent Health business) rose by 1.6 per cent to $7.9 billion.

     The general insurance business recorded an increase in the gross and net premiums by 5.4 per cent to $46 billion and 6.4 per cent to $32.1 billion respectively in 2015 when compared with 2014. The overall retention ratio increased from 69.1 per cent to 69.8 per cent.

     The business growth in 2015 was mainly contributed by the Accident & Health business, the gross premiums of which surged by 17.9 per cent from $11.5 billion in 2014 to $13.6 billion in 2015. The gross premiums of the Motor Vehicle business also rose by 9.4 per cent from $4.8 billion in 2014 to $5.3 billion in 2015.
      
     The overall underwriting profit of the general insurance business decreased from $3 billion in 2014 to $1.2 billion in 2015, mainly due to adverse claims experience. The net claims incurred ratio increased from 56.4 per cent in 2014 to 62.2 per cent in 2015.

     The Property Damage business recorded an underwriting profit of $670 million and continued to be the largest contributor in 2015. This was followed by the Goods in Transit business and the Accident & Health business with underwriting profit of $379 million and $331 million respectively. As regards the two major classes of compulsory insurance business, the underwriting performance of the direct Motor Vehicle business turned from a profit of $34 million to a loss of $152 million whilst the loss incurred by the Employees' Compensation business deepened from $75 million to $412 million.

     Detailed statistics, including industry aggregates and those of individual insurers, are available from the website of the OCI at www.oci.gov.hk.

Ends/Friday, September 30, 2016
Issued at HKT 15:00

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