The world’s top insurers are facing low bond yields, global geopolitical risk and regulatory pressures. Yet they’re forging ahead by enabling technology to woo new customers and cut claim handling costs and adding specialty or unique product lines to boost profits. “It’s a healthy industry from a balance sheet perspective, and there’s a lot of capital trying to get in,” says John Marra, insurance deals leader with PwC in New York City.
The top three insurers on the Forbes Global 2000 list of most powerful companies—Ping An Insurance Group, Allianz Group and AXA Group–are diversified players, with life & health, property & casualty, and financial services divisions.
The FORBES Global 2000 ranking is based on a composite score from equally-weighted measures of revenue, profits, assets and market value. Among the world’s 25 largest insurers, China, Japan and the United States each house four, Switzerland and the United Kingdom house three, Germany has two, and Canada, France, Italy, Hong Kong and Taiwan each claim one spot.
China’s Ping An Insurance Group ranks first among insurers, moving up from overall spot #20 last year to #16 on this year’s list. Over the 12 months to April 7, when Global 2000 data was locked in, Ping An generated $106.6 billion in revenue, $9.5 billion in profits and its market capitalization stood at $100.8 billion. The tech-driven company boasted of 131 million customers at year-end 2016, up 20% from the beginning of the year, with nearly a quarter of the newcomers coming in online.
Germany’s Allianz ranks #2 among insurers, staying at #21 overall on the Forbes Global 2000. After posting strong 2016 results, Allianz announced a share buy-back of up to $3 billion over the next year to return unused funds once targeted for acquisitions.
France’s AXA Group, ranked #3 (#27 overall), just announced a big change as part of its Ambition 2020 transformation plan: its intention to IPO its U.S. operations, specifically its life and annuity units and its interest in struggling asset manager Alliance Bernstein.
Japan Holdings, ranked #4 (#45 overall), may be rethinking its international strategy, after it reported last month a $3.6 billion write-down over its $5.1 billion 2015 acquisition of Australia’s Toll Holdings.
MetLife, dropped from #48 to #174, (it ditched its spokesdog Snoopy last year and is in the process of spinning off its retail business—including flagging variable annuities—into Brighthouse Financial). For now, MetLife is still the top ranked U.S. insurer, followed by Travelers (#179), Aflac (#199) and Allstate (#200). Allstate’s latest big deal: the $1.4 billion acquisition of SquareTrade, a consumer electronics and appliance protection plan provider.
One big unknown looming over U.S.-based insurers and global companies with U.S. operations, is the prospect of tax reform under the Trump Administration. Non-U.S.-domiciled companies are also exploring the impact of just passed international financial reporting standards set to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2021.
The FORBES Global 2000 ranking is based on a composite score from equally-weighted measures of revenue, profits, assets and market value. The 2017 list features public companies from 58 countries that together account for $35.3 trillion in revenue, $2.5 trillion in profit, $169.1 trillion of assets, and have a combined market value of $48.8 trillion.
