Hong Kong's gross premiums of insurance industry up 9 pct in 2011

HONG KONG, March 15 (Xinhua) -- Hong Kong's total gross premiums of its insurance industry in 2011 rose 9 percent from a year earlier to 225.8 billion HK dollars (about 29.1 billion U.S. dollars), the city's Office of the Commissioner of Insurance said here Thursday.

The gross and net premiums of general insurance business recorded a growth of 10.7 percent to 34.7 billion HK dollars and 8.5 percent to 23.8 billion HK dollars respectively in 2011 compared with 2010.

Overall underwriting profit also recorded an increase from 2.6 billion HK dollars in 2010 to 3 billion HK dollars in 2011.

On direct business, gross and net premiums gained 6.4 percent to 25.6 billion HK dollars and 6.3 percent to 18.8 billion HK dollars respectively in 2011 compared with 2010.

Accident and Health business continued to grow, with gross and net premiums reaching 8.9 billion HK dollars and 7.4 billion HK dollars respectively.

General Liability business and Motor Vehicle business also contributed to the premium growth. The former recorded gross and net premiums of 6.6 billion HK dollars and 4.8 billion HK dollars respectively, while the latter recorded premiums of 3.2 billion HK dollars and 2.6 billion HK dollars respectively.

However, owing to the slowdown in property transactions, gross and net premiums of Pecuniary Loss business dropped by 21.4 percent and 37.7 percent to 1.3 billion HK dollars and 677 million HK dollars respectively.