Life insurance stocks rise on upbeat February data; brokerages bullish on SBI Life, Max Financial

Stocks

Life insurance stocks gained traction a day after IRDA data showed the sector saw strong growth in the month of February.

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Shares of life insurance companies such as SBI Life Insurance Company, HDFC Life Insurance Company, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company and Max Financial Services, traded with decent gains in morning trade on BSE on March 9.

Life insurance stocks gained traction a day after IRDAI data showed the sector saw strong growth in the month of February.

As highlighted by the brokerage firm Motilal Oswal Financial Services, private players’ individual weighted received premium (WRP) saw a strong rebound of 23 percent year-on-year (YoY) in February against 7 percent YoY in January.

The industry posted a 17.8 percent YoY growth in WRP. The rebound in private players continued led by a focus on non-PAR, with ULIPs seeing a recovery.

However, Motilal Oswal pointed out that in FY21 year-to-date, private players’ individual WRP fell 1.6 percent YoY. The same for the industry fell 7.5 percent YoY.

Among listed players, SBI Life posted a strong rebound of nearly 53 percent YoY after showing muted trends for many months. ICICI Prudential Life, too, posted a growth of 6.3 percent after reporting a consecutive decline for the past 13 months, Motilal Oswal said.

The resilient performance continued at Max Financial, up about 32 percent YoY. However, the growth momentum in HDFC Life slowed, up nearly 6 percent YoY against 24 percent in January, Motilal Oswal added.

Motilal Oswal expects premium growth to rebound over FY22 after seeing tepid trends, with ULIP showing a revival.

“Players continue to focus strongly on non-PAR and protection segments. Among players, we prefer Max Financial and SBI Life,” said the brokerage firm.

Global brokerage firm CLSA pointed out that the February monthly insurance numbers indicate a mixed trend and will translate to near-term uncertainty for protection margins and growth.

As reported by CNBC-TV18, CLSA recently downgraded ICICI Prudential and HDFC Life to ‘outperform’ and maintain ‘buy’ on SBI Life and Max Financial. It continues preferring top banks to life insurers.

Another global brokerage firm Nomura underscored player-wise, trends remained broadly similar in February.

As reported by CNBC-TV18, Nomura noted that both Max & HDFC Life continued delivering strong growth while SBI Life witnessed exceptionally strong growth of 53 percent YoY.

Nomura does not see downside risks to its growth assumptions.

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