Life insurance business growth story for June 2022

8 Jul 2022 , 01:07 PM

The IRDAI normally announces the monthly insurance business numbers at the start of the subsequent month. For the month of June 2022, the nodal regulator (IRDAI) has just put out the monthly business numbers. Here are some broad takeaways in terms of numbers.

1. Needless to say, LIC still dominates the life insurance market but its clout is reducing. If you look at the premium income for June 2022, it was Rs31,255 crore overall, out of which LIC accounted for Rs20,644 crore and private life insurers accounted for Rs10,611 crore. In terms of premium earned, LIC had a market share of 66.05% while private insurers had a market share of 33.95%.
2. Let us now turn to the mix of the premium collected. In terms of premiums collected in June 2022, LIC had a market share of 79.50% in group single premium and 96.42% in group non-single premium. However, if you look at individual non-single premiums, private insurers had a market share of 62.29% and even in individual single premium, their market share was impressive at 43.69%.
3. However, the situation changes drastically if you look at sum assured. Here the private life insurers have an overall market share of 85.24%. That is on account of private life insurers selling more of pure risk term cover policies where the ratio of sum assuredto premium is higher. On the other hand, LIC is still focused on endowments, money-backs and ULIPs.
4. Growth in premiums is where LIC is faltering in June 2022. The industry growth in premiums for June 2022 over June 2021 was just about 4.15%. However, the private life insurers saw premium growth of 29.19% while LIC saw premium de-growth of -5.29%. That is perhaps also reflecting on the stock price.
5. The LIC June 2022 de-growth could be attributed to a high base as LIC saw record insurance sales during the pandemic. To smoothen this effect, if we consider the first quarter of FY23 ended June 2022, overall insurance premium collections were up 39.73% yoy. However, the private life insurers saw a much healthier growth of 48.75% in the June 2022 quarter while the growth in premium collections of LIC was lower at 35.39%. The month of June 2022 may have been an aberration for LIC due to high base effect, but there is steady loss of market share that LIC has to contend with.

 
Our reading of the life premium collectionsfor June 2022

The table captures premiums across life insurers for June 2022 and for Q1FY23.

Insurer Category	Jun 2021	Jun 2022	Growth %	Jun-21 YTD	Jun-22 YTD	Growth %	Share
Private Total	8213.20	10610.89	29.19	17124.58	25473.53	48.75	34.58
Individual Single Premium	1215.26	1418.05	16.69	2674.25	3594.26	34.40	43.69
Individual Non-Single Premium	3425.26	4189.31	22.31	7058.07	10380.59	47.07	62.29
Group Single Premium	2651.46	4356.06	64.29	5945.22	9321.71	56.79	20.50
Group Non-Single Premium	5.88	12.49	112.30	34.22	39.02	14.02	3.58
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	915.33	634.98	-30.63	1412.83	2137.94	51.32	96.00
LIC of India	21796.28	20643.67	-5.29	35600.68	48201.00	35.39	65.42
Individual Single Premium	1573.43	1705.56	8.40	3355.47	4633.24	38.08	56.31
Individual Non-Single Premium	2114.01	2583.27	22.20	4656.09	6283.43	34.95	37.71
Group Single Premium	17912.99	16068.57	-10.30	27163.94	36143.86	33.06	79.50
Group Non-Single Premium	160.91	253.88	57.78	330.63	1051.36	217.99	96.42
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	34.94	32.38	-7.32	94.55	89.11	-5.76	4.00
Grand Total	30009.48	31254.55	4.15	52725.26	73674.53	39.73	100.00
Individual Single Premium	2788.68	3123.60	12.01	6029.72	8227.51	36.45	100.00
Individual Non-Single Premium	5539.28	6772.58	22.26	11714.15	16664.03	42.26	100.00
Group Single Premium	20564.45	20424.64	-0.68	33109.16	45465.57	37.32	100.00
Group Non-Single Premium	166.79	266.37	59.70	364.85	1090.38	198.86	100.00
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	950.27	667.36	-29.77	1507.38	2227.05	47.74	100.00

Data Source: IRDAI

One challenge that LIC appears to be facing is that its traditional focus areas like group single premium policies are facing negative growth. That can be attributed to insurance buyers adopting a more risk-off approach to insurance in tough macro conditions. Private insurers have been gaining traction in group premium policies, but that is on a much smaller base, so the growth tends to look inflated.  Growth has been largely focussed on the individual non-single premium space.

Our reading of the sum assured numbers for June 2022

The table captures sum assured across life insurers for June 2022 and for Q1FY23.

Insurer Category	Jun 2021	Jun 2022	Growth %	Jun-21 YTD	Jun-22 YTD	Growth %	Share
Private Total	357158.47	439118.92	22.95	1050009.60	1192681.24	13.59	85.24
Individual Single Premium	1814.61	1602.65	-11.68	4116.02	4156.44	0.98	54.70
Individual Non-Single Premium	109665.19	107852.31	-1.65	266809.22	284034.39	6.46	70.92
Group Single Premium	55097.09	111823.94	102.96	249261.43	305489.02	22.56	99.92
Group Non-Single Premium	14976.75	14150.29	-5.52	88217.87	30248.35	-65.71	86.17
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	175604.83	203689.73	15.99	441605.08	568753.04	28.79	87.46
LIC of India	92720.41	91688.72	-1.11	150621.41	206553.07	37.13	14.76
Individual Single Premium	1178.00	1384.49	17.53	2446.26	3441.66	40.69	45.30
Individual Non-Single Premium	33136.90	47963.31	44.74	72169.74	116491.36	61.41	29.08
Group Single Premium	54.39	103.63	90.55	128.27	233.14	81.75	0.08
Group Non-Single Premium	1177.50	2117.17	79.80	3217.47	4854.38	50.88	13.83
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	57173.61	40120.11	-29.83	72659.66	81532.54	12.21	12.54
Grand Total	449878.88	530807.64	17.99	1200631.01	1399234.31	16.54	100.00
Individual Single Premium	2992.61	2987.14	-0.18	6562.27	7598.11	15.78	100.00
Individual Non-Single Premium	142802.09	155815.62	9.11	338978.95	400525.75	18.16	100.00
Group Single Premium	55151.47	111927.58	102.95	249389.70	305722.16	22.59	100.00
Group Non-Single Premium	16154.26	16267.46	0.70	91435.34	35102.72	-61.61	100.00
Group Yearly Renewable Premium	232778.44	243809.85	4.74	514264.74	650285.58	26.45	100.00

Data Source: IRDAI

When it comes to sum assured, private insurers have an edge in terms of market share at 85.24%. Private insurers largely specialize in selling pure risk covers as compared to the LIC which has its traditional franchise in endowments and other investment-based policies. This has been the case all along in the life insurance business.

How private life insurance players fared in June 2022

Out of the 23 private life insurance players, the top 5 insurers viz. SBI Life, HDFC Life, ICICI Prudential Life, Bajaj Allianz Life and Max Life accounted for 72.5% of premium collections. Among the larger players, Bajaj Allianz was the sole private life insurer to show over 100% growth in premiums yoy. Other major private life insurers with growth above 50% included SBI Life, Tata AIA and Kotak Mahindra Life.
In the private life insurance space, growth mainly came from the individual single premium and the group single premium segments. Growth in the individual non-single life segment was a lot more subdued in June 2022.