Life is beautiful for National Mutual
National Mutual continues to be the clear leader in attracting life insurance premiums, despite strong inflow growth from arch-rival AMP.
National Mutual subsidiary AC&L has long been acknowledged the market leader in the income protection market and it appears the National Mutual is also succeeding in the trauma and term life markets.
National Mutual continues to be the clear leader in attracting life insurance premiums, despite strong inflow growth from arch-rival AMP.
National Mutual subsidiary AC&L has long been acknowledged the market leader in the income protection market and it appears the National Mutual is also succeeding in the trauma and term life markets.
According to actuarial and research group Plan For Life, National Mu-tual lead the life insurance risk product premiums race in the year to March, recording inflows of $480 million, about $125 million clear of Colonial, its nearest rival.
Inflows in all products provided by life insurance groups increased by 20 per cent over the year to about $35 billion. Plan For Life classify inflows as money flowing into individual and group superan-nuation funds, risk insurance and retirement income streams.
Individual superannuation savings showed by far the strongest growth, up 46 per cent to $13.6 billion, while risk insurance products also performed well, increasing inflows by 22 per cent to $2.4 billion.
Colonial reaped the benefits of last year's buying spree which wit-nessed the acquisition of Prudential and Legal & General. Colonial retained its number two position in inflows into risk products by in-creasing inflows by 25 per cent to $480 million.
AMP also experienced strong inflows into risk products in the year to March, following a fall-off in the previous year. AMP more than dou-bled inflows to $305 million. Strong growth was also recorded by Tower Life
The figures are the first time Plan For Life has collated figures on premium inflows.
"While we will still provide figures on the old-style parameters of annual premium sales, single premium sales and inforce annual pre-mium, we feel that these have become outdated and distort a companies true performance," the group says.
Ends
TABLE
Top 10 risk product inflows
Company Year to March 99($m)Year to March 98($m)
1. National Mutual 480 434
2. Colonial 355 286
3. AMP 305 150
4. Mercantile Mutual 204 182
5. MLC 175 149
6. Tyndall 123 113
7. Royal & SunAlliance 86 72
8. Citicorp 75 68
9. Westpac 74 66
10. Norwich 72 67
Source: Plan For Life
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