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Allianz to double agents in Taiwan

“We are positive and remain committed to our business in Asia.” — Werner Zedelius, Allianz board member

Allianz SE doesn’t rule out acquisitions in developing countries and expects growth in China to continue. In Taiwan, it plans to almost double its number of insurance agents.

“We are not excluding acquisitions in developing countries, but it is not high on our list of priorities,” Werner Zedelius, a management-board member at the Munich-based company, told reporters in Taipei yesterday. “The focus is on internal growth.”

Allianz aims to boost the number of agents in Taiwan from 1,680 to 3,000 next year, said Chris James, CEO of Allianz Taiwan Life Insurance Co (安聯人壽).

Allianz plans to strengthen its distribution channels and focus on introducing more regular premium products and protection products in global markets, Zedelius said. Allianz ended a seven-year foray into full-scale banking in January when it sold Dresdner Bank to Commerzbank AG for 5.1 billion euros (US$7.1 billion).

“We are positive and remain committed to our business in Asia, and we see considerable growth coming over the next three years,” Zedelius said.

Allianz’s Taiwan life insurance unit ranked eighth in the domestic market and has 4.4 percent market share. Total premiums in the first four months reached NT$19.8 billion (US$602 million).

Still, Allianz won’t consider buying American International Group Inc.’s Taiwan unit, or invest in the island’s real estate market, Zedelius said.

AIG is looking for buyers for Nan Shan Life Insurance Co (南山人壽), the Chinese-language Apple Daily reported yesterday.

In April, Allianz sold 3.216 billion Hong Kong-listed shares, or half its stake, in Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd (ICBC, 中國工商銀行) as a lockup ended.

“We don’t have any plans in this regard,” Zedelius said when asked about plans to sell more ICBC shares in October, when a lockup agreement on the remainder of the shares ends.

After the April sale, Allianz holds 0.97 percent of ICBC’s total outstanding shares, and 3.87 percent of ICBC’s Hong Kong-listed shares, the insurer said in a statement on April 28.

“After holding the ICBC stake for some years, selling half of it was a thing we thought at that time a commercially viable decision,” Zedelius said.
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