Ping An Reports Steady Growth of 21.5% in Operating Profit Attributable to Shareholders of Parent Company in 9M 19
The Group Prepares for a Consumer Finance Joint Venture
HONG KONG and SHANGHAI, Oct. 24, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Ping An Insurance (Group) of Company of China, Ltd. (hereafter "Ping An" or the "Group", HKEx: 2318; SSE: 601318) today announced its results for the nine months ended 30 September 2019.
In the first nine months of 2019, overall performance and various businesses of Ping An maintained steady growth. Ping An achieved an operating profit attributable to shareholders of the parent company of RMB104,061 million, up 21.5% year on year. Net profit attributable to shareholders of the parent company rose 63.2% year on year to RMB129,567 million. Furthermore, customer development yielded strong results. As of 30 September 2019, the Group had over 200 million retail customers, up 9.5% from the beginning of the year, and 594 million internet users, up 10.4% from the beginning of the year. In the first nine months of 2019, the Group acquired 29.72 million new customers, of whom 11.58 million or 39.0% were sourced from internet users within the Group's five ecosystems.
The Board of Directors adopted a resolution for Ping An to establish a nationwide technology-powered consumer finance joint venture. The new enterprise is currently involved in relevant regulatory approval procedures.
Financial Businesses: Life and health insurance NBV margin rose 5.3 pps year on year, Property & Casualty operating profit grew 75.5% year on year, and Ping An Bank furthered its retail transformation
In the first nine months of 2019, the Group upheld the philosophy that "insurance should be protection-oriented". The Group optimized the product portfolio and prioritized sales of high-value, high-protection products. Operating profit of the life and health insurance business reached RMB69,104 million, up 30.5% year on year. New business value ("NBV") grew by 4.5% year on year to RMB58,805 million, mainly due to the increasing contribution of the NBV margin. NBV margin reached 48.1%, up 5.3 pps year on year. As of 30 September 2019, the number of life insurance sales agents had decreased by 12.1% from the beginning of the year to 1.245 million, down by 3.2% from 30 June 2019. New individual life insurance policies per agent in the first nine months of 2019 increased to 1.39 per month, up 9.4% year on year.
Ping An Property & Casualty maintained stable business growth and excellent business quality. In the first nine months of 2019, Ping An Property & Casualty recorded a premium income of RMB196,875 million, up 8.7% year on year. Operating profit increased by 75.5% year on year to RMB14,254 million. Combined ratio reached 96.2%, outperforming the industry. Ping An Property & Casualty embedded the AI-powered image-based loss assessment technology in the "Ping An Auto Owner" app to facilitate free self-assessment of external damage. The app had a high assessment success rate of 95%.
In the first nine months of 2019, the Group's annualized net investment yield of the investment portfolio of insurance funds was 4.9%.This was mainly due to the year-on-year increase in investment income in recovering capital markets. The Group's annualized total investment yield was 6.0%.
Ping An Bank maintained stable and healthy business growth. Ping An Bank realized revenues of RMB102,958 million, up 18.8% year on year, and a net profit of RMB23,621 million, up 15.5% year on year. Ping An Bank furthered its retail transformation. As of 30 September 2019, Ping An Bank's retail assets under management ("AUM") rose by 32.1% from the beginning of the year to RMB1,872,178 million. Asset quality improved gradually and risk compensation was further strengthened. The provision coverage ratio grew by 30.94 pps from the beginning of the year to 186.18%.
Technology Businesses: The Group further developed its technology strategy, various businesses developed rapidly, and the total revenue of Technology Businesses for the first nine months of 2019 was RMB60,040 million, up 33.1% year on year
Ping An attaches great importance to core technology research and development and proprietary intellectual property control. As of 30 September 2019, Ping An's technology patent applications increased by 7,977 from the beginning of the year to 20,248, more than most international financial institutions. The applications included 4,396 filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty ("PCT") and abroad. Ping An further developed its technology strategy, and various businesses maintained rapid development. The total revenue of the technology businesses for the first nine months of 2019 reached RMB60,040 million, up 33.1% year on year.
In the first nine months of 2019, Lufax Holding's revenue and profit continued to grow steadily. In the field of online wealth management, customer assets dropped by 5.0% from the beginning of the year to RMB350,857 million due to restrictions on sales of online lending products. In retail lending, Lufax Holding's balance of loans under management grew steadily by 17.7% to RMB441,213 million from the beginning of the year. In government finance, Lufax Holding continued to increase application and promotion of fintech in fiscal management, launching smart fiscal projects in multiple provinces and cities across China.
OneConnect is China's leading technology-as-a-service cloud platform with most financial institutions clients in China. As of 30 September 2019, it had served over 618 banks, 84 insurance companies, including all the large banks, 99% of city commercial banks, and 46% of insurers in China. Through these institutions, OneConnect reaches out to hundreds of millions of end customers.
Ping An Good Doctor, as a significant part in the Group's healthcare ecosystem, provides users with comprehensive family doctor services via AI-aided in-house medical staff as the core. At the same time, it integrates the offline health care service network to provide users with online-merge-offline health care services.
Ping An HealthKonnect is committed to becoming a smart technology company fully empowering the health care ecosystem. As of 30 September 2019, Ping An HealthKonnect had provided Social Health Insurance (SHI) management services for SHI fund managers in over 200 cities, covering over 800 million insured members.
Autohome provides auto consumers with diverse products and services, continuously promotes the smart transformation and upgrading of customers and users, consolidates and develops the three core competencies of content, data and team to better serve customers and users.
Ping An Smart City Business leverages technology to enable urban development and builds an integrated platform system that centers on government services, economic development, and people's livelihood. The business now covers 21 areas, including health care, government administration, transportation, environmental protection, legal affairs, education and agriculture. Ping An Smart City is rolling out its business to more than 100 cities in China as well as multiple countries and regions involved in the Belt and Road Initiative, and is proactively implementing the philosophy of serving the country, society and public.
Forging ahead, Peter Ma, Chairman and CEO of Ping An, said, "Ping An closely follows national policies. Under the 'finance + technology' and 'finance + ecosystem' strategies, Ping An will proactively develop its five ecosystems, increase R&D investment, promote data-driven smart management, and offer excellent products and services to customers. Meanwhile, Ping An leverages its corporate resources and vigorously supports poverty alleviation. The Group continues to give back to society by empowering villages through the Ping An Rural Communities Support. Remaining true to our original aspiration and mission, we will continue to seek innovations, promote business growth, create value for customers and shareholders, and contribute to the country and society. By doing so, Ping An will strive to become a world-leading technology-powered retail financial services group."
About Ping An Group
Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd. (Ping An) is a world-leading technology-powered retail financial services group. With 201 million retail customers and 594 million Internet users, Ping An is one of the largest financial services companies in the world.
Ping An has two over-arching strategies, "pan financial assets" and "pan healthcare", which focus on the provision of financial and healthcare services through our integrated financial services platform and our five ecosystems of financial services, health care, auto services, real estate services and smart city services. Our "finance + technology" and "finance + ecosystems" strategies aim to provide customers and internet users with innovative and simple products and services. As China's first joint stock insurance company, Ping An Group is committed to upholding the highest standards of corporate reporting and corporate governance. The Company is listed on the stock exchanges in Hong Kong and Shanghai.
Ping An ranked 7th on the Forbes Global 2000 list and 29th on the Fortune Global 500 list. Ping An also ranked 40th on the 2019 WPP Millward Brown BrandZTM Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands list. For more information, please visit www.pingan.cn.
For enquiries, please contact:
Gareth Hewett @ +852 68822027 or gareth.john@pingan.com.hk
Cecile Zhang @ +852 66813178 or cecile.zhang@pingan.com.hk
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