BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Ping An Insurance (Group) Co of China Ltd reported on Monday a 36.1% rise in net profit in the first nine months of the year, driven by growing investment returns and new policies sold as the economy recovers.
The insurance company posted 119.18 billion yuan ($17 billion) in net profit, the Chinese insurance giant said in a filing released on Monday.
“China’s economy recovered steadily in the third quarter of 2024 in the face of short-term challenges including economic restructuring, lackluster growth momentum, and mounting external uncertainty,” Ping An said in the filing.
The group’s number of retail customers rose 3.8% to 240.47 million at the end of September from the end of December, the filing showed.
Ping An’s insurance funds investment portfolio reached an
annualized comprehensive investment yield of 5% in the first nine months this year, up 1.3 percentage points from the same period a year ago.
New business value of life and health insurance business, which measures the profitability of new policies sold, grew 34.1% year-on-year to 35.16 billion yuan.
Its banking unit, Ping An Bank, last week reported its third-quarter net profits fell 2.8% year-on-year.
($1 = 7.1116 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Ziyi Tang and Engen Tham; Editing by Jan Harvey and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
