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Insurance
BusinessChina Business

Chinese insurance giant Ping An’s profit falls to 5-year low amid weakness in asset management, tech businesses

  • Firm will ‘pursue high-quality development despite challenges and difficulties’ in 2024, chairman says
  • Ping An’s net profit for 2023 fell 23 per cent year on year to 85.67 billion yuan (US$11.9 billion)

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The value of Ping An’s new business in life and health insurance on a like-for-like basis, a key measure of sales and future growth, rose by 36 per cent to 39.26 billion yuan. Photo: Shutterstock
Enoch Yiu
Ping An Insurance (Group), China’s largest insurer by market capitalisation, said its earnings fell for 2023 to their lowest level in five years, as strong sales of new policies were offset by setbacks in its asset management and technology investment businesses.
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Its net profit fell 23 per cent year on year to 85.67 billion yuan (US$11.9 billion), according to a stock exchange filing made after the market closed in Hong Kong on Thursday. These are Ping An’s lowest earnings in five years, according to revised comparison data provided by the insurer, which has adopted new accounting standards.

Operating profit, which excludes one-off items and valuation changes in its investment portfolio, stood at 117.98 billion yuan, or 6.66 yuan per share, down 20 per cent from a year earlier. The operating profit is also Ping An’s lowest in five years.

“Looking ahead to 2024, we will pursue high-quality development despite challenges and difficulties,” chairman Peter Ma Mingzhe said in the exchange filing.

“We firmly believe that favourable conditions for China’s development outweigh unfavourable factors, and the essential long-term uptrend of the Chinese economy has not changed,” he said, adding that Ping An will continue to develop its three core businesses: insurance, technology and healthcare.

A pavement advertisement for Ping An insurance products in Yichang, a city in China’s central Hubei province. Photo: Reuters
A pavement advertisement for Ping An insurance products in Yichang, a city in China’s central Hubei province. Photo: Reuters
Mainland Chinese life insurers have benefited from lower domestic interest rates, which increased the allure of investment-linked insurance products that offer higher potential returns than time deposits. China’s state-controlled banks lowered deposit rates three times last year to help revive a faltering economy.
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