PhilAXA Life eyes P8.5B in premium income by 2007

The Philippine AXA Life Insurance Corp. (Philippine AXA Life) is looking to increase its premium income to P8.5 billion by 2007 buoyed by a bigger and stronger sales force growing by a 100 percent in the same timeframe.

That would likewise mean that insurer’s appraised value of P5 billion last year should expand to P12.8 billion by 2007. Appraised value is basically how much the company or insurer is worth.

Premium income in 2003 was placed at P2.6 billion moving forward to P4.1 billion last year. The insurance company, which is affiliated with the Metrobank Group, took firm hold of fourth spot overall among the country’s life inurance companies in the past two years.

Profitability remained firm as it registered a net income of P27 million last year versus the 2003 income of P19.7 million.

In the past two years, the major contributor to premium income was bancassurance, or the sale of policies through the branch network of Metrobank. That was placed at roughly 70 percent of total sales with the balance coming from its 800 agency force.

"We would like the agency force to grow by a 100 percent by 2007, with the ratio of contributions reaching an equal 50 percent," Victor P. Quisumbing, Philippine AXA Life president and chief executive officer said.

But that may be deceiving as bancassurance contributions merely tapped 20 to 25 percent of its potentials last year mainly coming from Metrobank branches (roughly 500 branches).

"The challenge is to capture the remaining 75 to 80 percent!" Quisumbing added.

He, however, lamented that the political circus the past months have not help the insurance industry and the economy move forward. In the past 12 months, the Philippine economy shown signs of returning to the economic recovery map along with its Asian neighbors.

But the recent controversies surrounding electoral fraud and corruption in the highest levels of the political hierarchy is once more derailing progress.

The country’s life insurance indsutry manages to survive, and in some cases improve its status during the times of crisis. "But the condition of the Philippine economy will surely dictate the rate of growth of the industry."

Nonetheless, the Philippine AXA Life is confident it can hurdle all odds with its three-year Philippine six growth goal.

That means increasing the value of its first-year business, aggressively grow its premium income, expand business index, reduce its management expense ratio, improve business persistency, and achieve top quantile score as set by mother unit, AXA Group of Companies.

It does help to be affiliated to one of the country’s biggest financial conglomerate and one of the world’s biggest insurer and financial institution.