The Financial Services Commission (FSC) has said that a private equity firm (PEF) that Korea Development Bank (KDB) set up in March 2010 with Consus Asset Management to acquire the life insurer is not subject to the Financial Holding Companies Act, which bans a PEF from owning a financial services firm for more than a decade.
South Korean insurers' reverse margin is estimated to hit an all-time high of more than KRW6tn ($4.9bn) as interest rates remain at close to zero.
Hanwha Life Insurance, South Korea's second largest life insurer, became a penny stock this month, reported Bloomberg.
South Korea's chief financial regulator has announced a number of new policy measures and reforms, including a measure to prevent parents who are estranged from their children from receiving insurance benefits on their children's death.
While Chinese production lines are almost back to full capacity after the lockdown in January and February to tame the spread of the coronavirus, exporters in China are now facing up to reality. Global demand has dropped drastically as many of the world's economies see massive disruptions in an effort to control the worldwide pandemic.
Life insurers and regulators have to think creatively of ways long-term money can ride out a crisis that by its nature will be relatively short-term, says Mr Brad W Setser, a senior fellow for international economics at the think tank Council on Foreign Relations.
McLarens, a global loss adjuster specializing in complex, commercial and niche markets, today announced the hiring of Stephen Toomer as managing director of McLarens Korea. Mr Toomer is an established international executive loss adjuster.
The decision of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) to defer the implementation of IFRS 17 on Insurance Contracts by a year to 2023 provides local insurers more time to ensure compliance amid lowered interest rates.
Tong Yang Life's (TYL), South Korea's sixth largest life insurer\, with a market share of around 5% by premium income at end-September 2019, continues to optimise its product mix by focusing on the sale of more profitable protection-type policies and has multiple distribution channels, notes Fitch Ratings.
South Korean insurance firms' combined net profit fell to the lowest level in a decade last year due in part to increased auto insurance losses, according to preliminary data from the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS).