A bancassurance company formed by a leading local mortgage lender and a Paris-based insurance company announced yesterday it would start operations at its more than 300 branches throughout the nation.
BNP Paribas Assurance TCB Life Insurance Co (合作金庫人壽), established by the Taiwan Cooperative Bank (TCB, 合作金庫) and BNP Paribas Assurance, set a one-year premium objective of NT$50 billion (US$1.59 billion) within three years.
“It is estimated that the company will rank among the top 10 insurers in Taiwan following its operations this year and will break even within three years,” chairman Fan Yang-jen (范揚禎) told a media briefing.
TOP FIVE
Leveraging on BNP Paribas Assurance’s leadership in global mortgage insurance as well as TCB’s position in the local mortgage loan business, Fan said the new venture was striving to become one of the top five bancassurance companies in Taiwan.
Fan said that with TCB’s mortgage loan balance of NT$560 billion and more than NT$100 billion in loans made to borrowers each year, the new insurance entity’s penetration rate was expected to reach 30 percent in the first year of operation.
The establishment of BNP Paribas TCB Life marked the latest joint venture between a local bank and a foreign insurance company, despite the fact that five foreign insurance firms have exited the Taiwanese market since the financial downturn began in 2008.
Also speaking at the press conference, TCB chairman Liu Deng-cheng (劉燈城) said cooperation between the two companies showed that “most foreign insurance companies remain upbeat about the potential of the Taiwanese insurance sector.”
PRIORITIES
The new life insurer said in a statement that in the initial stage of operations it would focus on mortgage insurance products as one of its core businesses.
The company said that with changes in consumer behavior, banks had become a mainstream sales channel for insurance products.
More than 67 percent of total premiums of NT$167 billion in January and February came from bancassurance, it said.
Separately, Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) yesterday rebranded its 22 local outlets, completing its acquisition of The Royal Bank of Scotland’s Taiwan business and ABN AMRO’s private banking business here.
Targeting affluent Taiwanese and family clients, ANZ and its 1,400 staff will develop a balanced business in Taiwan, CEO for the Asia Pacific, Europe and America Alex Thursby said.
EXPANSION
Thursby said the bank also intended to open 16 new outlets in Taiwan, which it says is the fourth-largest banking market in Asia, within two years.
The bank, however, has no immediate plans for merger-and-acquisition opportunities as its priority is to consolidate and seek organic growth, he said.
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