Manulife expects 40% rise in premium income

JAKARTA (JP): Life insurance company PT Dharmala Manulife said here on Friday it expected this year to boost its premium income by 40 percent from Rp 328 billion in 1998.

Dharmala Manulife vice president Adi Purnomo said on Friday the rise would in part result from last May's launching of a new product, called the Pro-invest scheme, which drew 4000 new policy holders since June.

The company's premium income from the Pro-invest program reached Rp 10 billion, he said.

Dharmala's premium income grew by 40 percent last year to Rp 328 billion, Adi said.

Its assets reached Rp 1.03 trillion, of which Rp 949 billion were invested by the company, and Rp 872 billion was kept as reserves, he said.

Adi said 75 percent of the Rp 949 billion was invested in time deposits, 5 percent in mutual funds, 2 percent on obligations, 2 percent on share placement, and 8 percent on policy borrowing last year.

The company paid Rp 495 billion in claims last year, Rp 265 of which were maturity and surrender payments and Rp 30 billion were payments for deaths and accidents.

Dharmala Manulife is owned 51 percent by Canada-based Manulife Financial, 40 percent by the Dharmala Group and the remaining 9 percent belongs to the International Financial Corporation.

At Friday's press briefing the company announced that its parent company, Manulife, had signed an agreement to establish a joint-venture with Japan's Daihyaku Mutual Life Insurance Company.

Manulife Financial's senior vice president for Asian Operations, David Horman, said his company and Daihyaku will each initially invest 40 billion yen (US$350 million) as paid-up capital.

Manulife will own a 75 percent controlling share in the joint- venture, which will start operations on April 1, and Daihyaku will own the remaining 25 percent, he said.

Daihyaku is the fifteenth largest insurance firm in Japan, with 1.4 million policy holders. (das)