Spectacular moves on the insurance market in 2005: in the general insurance sector, Asiban climbed from 8th in 2004 to the 4th place, and ING remained the market leader on the life insurance market, followed by AIG Life and Asiban, which left Asirom behind.
The insurance market tripled over the last five years, reaching about 1.2 billion euros in 2005, an increase of approximately 40% from the previous year. The players on the market say this rate of growth will hold and foreign investments will continue to flow. Big names on the international market are also present on the Romanian insurance market: AIG, Allianz, Vienna Insurance Group (former Wiener Staedtische), Uniqa, Generali and Aviva.
“The interest is there and big companies, not necessarily from the EU, may arrive this year. Establishing an insurance company here gives that particular player the opportunity to operate on a market in the Union. Only the companies with a large market share are attractive, but there”s just a handful of those left,” says Nicolae Crisan, the chairman of the Insurance Supervision Commission (CSA).
The targets of the foreign investors could be Asirom and Ardaf. Sources on the market say that Italian group Fondiaria is in talks to take over Asirom, but the shareholders of the Romanian company deny this information. Ardaf is also reportedly for sale, but the businessman that controls it, Ovidiu Tender, denies this.
The top three insurance companies on the insurance market last year kept the positions they held in 2004. Allianz-Tiriac remained the leader of the insurance market, ending the year with about 238 million euros in underwritten premiums, out of which 219 million euros derived from the general insurance sector. Asirom occupies second position on the non-life insurance market as in 2004, posting more than 136 million euros in premiums underwritten on the general insurance sector last year.
Omniasig ranks third on the market, after merging with Omniasig-AGI and Omniasig-Asirag, acquired in 2004, pushed its business up, to over 116 million euros.
BT Asigurari made a spectacular leap, entering the top ten, with a 26.9 million-euro revenue on the general insurance market, leaving AIG Romania behind, which ended 2005 with 21.6 million euros in premiums underwritten.
BCR Asigurari in turn was quick to move last year, climbing two places to number seven, with 60.7 million euros in revenues from general insurance.
ING remained the leader of the life insurance market, followed by AIG Life, with 30 million euros in underwritten premiums, which displaced Asirom. Third came Asiban, with a 24.6 million-euro revenue, an increase of 165.3% from 2004, when it ranked sixth. The highest growth of all the top ten life insurance companies, 351.7% was posted by BCR Asigurari, which climbed five places to the fifth top spot.
Some players on the market say that the insurers could be faced with a wave of redemption of policies similar to private pensions this year, because the premiums paid for private pensions will be fiscally deductible of up to 200 euros a year, while the premiums paid for life insurance policies similar to private pensions are not deductible.