Asirom steps into the black

Asirom, the second largest insurance company on the domestic market, registered a 5% rise in turnover last year and managed to step into the black, according to an announcement the company made yesterday. Asirom underwrote gross premiums worth 600.6 million RON (170.4 million euros), an increase of some 5% in RON last year, though still far behind the market growth, estimated at 33%. “The growth was quite slow, because we restructured our portfolio and we reduced the exposure on car insurance,” Boris Schneider (photo), general manager of the company told ZF. Schneider would not comment on the value of the profit, as the data were still preliminary and not audited, he explained. The fire and natural disaster insurance saw the fastest growth last year, namely 35%, followed by property insurance, 9.5%. The insurer sealed 2.1 million new insurance contracts last year, while the total volume of claims and indemnities settled amounted to 385.5 million RON (109.4 million euros). The claims settled by Asirom increased by 9% in RON compared with 2005, a faster growth pace compared with the revenues derived from premiums. “We managed to turn the company around to a state of normality, after the massive losses we incurred over the recent years. We are prepared for a more rapid growth, namely by 20% above the market average growth, so as to recover the lost ground of 2006,” Schneider also said.