Tariff increases and new business to boost Saudi insurance sector

JEDDAH: Following a series of rights issues during 2014 and 2015, many local insurers are now actively choosing to operate at a stronger level of capitalization than in the past, according to a top rating agency.

“We believe gross premiums in Saudi Arabia could rise by nearly 25 percent in 2015, principally fueled by tariff increases, to over SR35 billion ($9.3 billion) for the full year,” said a press release from Standard and Poors Ratings Services.
“We expect the third quarter and 2015 year-end results to confirm the generally improving earnings trend of the past 18 months,” it stated.
“There are still no signs of any of the 34 companies in Saudi Arabia’s crowded insurance sector attempting to overcome legal and financial impediments to mergers and acquisitions,” said the agency.
“Although performance varies considerably among the 34 companies, Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services considers that the general trend is a positive one, encompassing improving tariffs, increasing earnings, enhanced capitalization, and growing total premium volumes,” said the report.
The S&P team explained they they expect the sector’s full-year 2015 gross premiums to be about 25 percent higher than those in 2014, largely because of price increases on the main insurance lines — group medical and motor.
“Growing demand for insurance in the near term, combined with regulatory encouragement of highly prudential “actuarial pricing” after the price war of 2012-2013, means that Saudi Arabia’s insurers are showing few signs of being affected by the fall in oil prices, though the subject of oil revenues remains a central concern at sovereign and macroeconomic levels,” said the report.
“Oil prices may have fallen well below $50 per barrel over the past 12 months — they routinely reached $115 per barrel (Brent Index) in mid-2014 — but Saudi insurers write relatively little commercial or industrial risk business, and retain less,” the report pointed out.
“Consequently, we consider that the strong growth in sector premiums is likely being driven by the demographics of an expanding population. There are some 30 million to 20 million Saudi nationals, plus 10 million foreign workers and dependents, who increasingly require insurance cover for their possessions and travel,” said the S&P report.
“Additionally, many local employers are now offering their Saudi staff access to the same group medical cover that is compulsory for their foreign colleagues,” it added.
Nearly all Saudi insurers are experiencing clear earnings benefits from the improved pricing environment in their single, domestic market.
The often underpriced business written during the 2012-2013 price war is running off and the more attractive margins on more recent business are emerging as profit. This takes time in Saudi Arabia because insurers typically hold sizeable unearned premium reserves and it is compulsory, but often technically redundant, to hold bad and doubtful debt provisions on all premium income deferred by more than 90 days from contract inception, S&P added.
Total results for H2 2015 are likely to comfortably exceed the SR183.2 million of post-tax comprehensive earnings reported for H1 2015, although performance will continue to vary greatly from company to company, according to S&P.
“Many insurers have told us that they have seen robust rate rises of 15 percent — 20 percent or more in 2015. Of Saudi Arabia’s 34 local insurers, 21 reported positive comprehensive net income for the first half of 2015 totaling SR602.0 million, while 13 reported cumulative first half losses of SR418.8 million,” added the report.
In most cases, those companies reporting losses despite the increasingly attractive pricing environment are relatively recent start-up companies such as MetLife, AIG & ANB Cooperative Insurance Co., which commenced active trading in 2014, or health insurance specialist, Saudi Enaya Cooperative Insurance Co., which became operational in 2013 but only wrote SR36.3 million of gross premiums during the first half of 2015.
In such cases, the high fixed costs, charges, and taxes associated with operating in Saudi Arabia will continue to consume pretax income until business volumes and margins rise sufficiently to help generate an overall profit. That said, internal operational and administrative issues have also affected some companies, leading to losses at several longer-established insurers, where the underlying book f business could normally be expected to generate robust earnings in current market conditions.
The report said that Tawuniya, BUPA Arabia, and MedGulf booked a full 52.4 percent of all the premium written in Saudi Arabia during the first half of 2015.
Over the same period, the top 15 insurers wrote SR16.2 billion or 85.2 percent of the sector’s total gross premiums of SR19.0 billion. Little premium was left for the sector’s other 19 companies.
“We do not expect the business breakdown to change much in 2015 and 2016, compared with 2014. In 2014, medical insurance comprised 51.6 percent of the sector’s GPW and 60.2 percent of net premium written, and motor accounted for 26.3 percent of gross and 31.2 percent of net premiums. Thus, these two lines together represented over 90 percent of all net retained business in Saudi Arabia. In our view, primary insurers will continue to cede most of their commercial and industrial exposure to international reinsurers, given the attractive rates and commissions available in the current soft reinsurance market,” S&P said.