The Insurance Commission recently released the top Life Insurance Companies according to Total Premium Income as of December 31, 2012. There were a lot changes in the rankings from 2011, particularly in the top 5 rank.

Canadian insurer Sun Life Retains it’s number 1 position, a position it held since last year when they wrestled it from American insurance giant Philam Life. What is interesting to note is not only did they retain their ranking, the gap between the first and the second ranked company widened by a huge margin. In 2011, Sun Life surpassed Philam Life by a mere 300 Million by year end. By contrast, Sun Life’s difference from the runner-up in 2012 was a whopping 5 Billion Pesos with an astounding 44% growth from their 2011 numbers. It seems that Sun Life has been very productive and their various initiatives was bearing fruit, obviously — something her competitors are really seriously looking at for sure.

Coming in at 2nd place is the U.K. insurer Pru Life who had an astonishing growth and a jump of 2 notches from 4th in 2011 to 2nd in 2012. Last year was definitely a banner year for Pru Life who I noticed have been very active in its recruitment of more agents, among other initiatives. Moving 2 notches in the top 5 rank is no easy feat but Prulife of UK goes ahead of Philam Life who slips from number 2 in 2011 to number 3 in 2012. Prulife UK registered a huge growth of 57% from its previous year’s numbers which was enough to overtake Philam, albeit by a narrow margin of about 300 Million Pesos. Philam Life registered a growth of 13% from its 2011 premium base.

French insurer and one of the country’s pioneer in Bancassurance, Philippine AXA slips from it’s 2011 rank of number 3 to the 4th largest insurer by 2012 with a very respectable 23% growth in premiums from 2011 to 2012. Coming at the 5th place is BPI-Philam, the Bancassurance partnership between BPI and Philamlife who overtakes Insular Life who lands at the 6th spot. BPI Philam registered an incredible 78% growth from its 2011 numbers and was 800 Million Pesos away from Philippine AXA’s 4th rank. Insular Life delivered good numbers in 2012 with a growth of 23% from its previous year’s premium base.

Canadian insurer and the 2nd oldest life insurer in the Philippines Manulife and the Bancassarance organization Sun Life Grepa retains its 2011 rankings at 7th and 8th respectively. Both organizations also registered good growth in 2012.

Manulife Chinabank and PNB Life, both Bancassurance dominated organizations are in the top 10 ranks at number 9 and 10 respectively, also registering good growth numbers.

Cocolife and Generali Philippines slips out of the top 10 rankings by the end of 2012.

Some interesting facts:

1) 2 out of the top 5 insurers are predominantly Bancassurance organizations. Simply put, Bancassurance is an organization that can sell insurance products to the bank clients and are co-owned by an insurance company and a bank.

2) 5 out of the top 10 insurers are predominantly Bancassurance Organizations.

3) 3 companies in the top 10 are actually subsidiaries of 3 other companies in the roster.

4) Only 1 Filipino insurance companies makes it to the top 10, Insular Life making them the largest Filipino insurance company. 

5) Total Premiums generated by all Life Insurance companies totaled to P119,454,550,174

Congratulations to all the Life Insurance companies. My prayer is that more and more Filipinos understand the benefits of life insurance and be protected from life’s uncertainties.

I made a post about how financial services companies particularly life insurance companies have made strides in their marketing techniques. Sun Life actively using social media and even sponsored short-films.

Not to be outdone is Philamlife. I stumbled upon a promotional video of Philamlife and I was expecting the usual boring infomercial type of a video. It was a delight to see an MTV by no less than Bamboo singing a song about life and planning. Wow, this is a really good video and an awesome marketing campaign! Good job Philamlife… we want to see more!

Sun Life and Philamlife have paved the way to ‘out of the box’ marketing campaigns that will surely attract a lot of Filipinos who desperately need the benefits of life insurance. In my opinion, this is an awesome way to create awareness and I am so glad the 2 largest insurance have been bold in this arena — probably why they are the 2 largest insurers of the country.

The Insurance Commission has released the ranking of the top Life Insurance Companies as of 2011 according to total premium income.

For the first time in its over 100 years of operations in the country, Canadian insurer Sun Life Financial emerged as the number 1 life insurance company beating the perennial leader Philamlife by a narrow margin of about 300 million in premiums. It will be interesting to watch out how the two largest life insurers will fare for 2012. Will Sunlife continue with its market leadership or will it be short-lived and concede it to Philamlife? My friends from both companies are all pumped up and this will be a good match to watch. Personally, I always believe that competition is good for everyone.

The French insurance company’s partnership with Metrobank continues to grow its Philippine business as Philippine AXA steadily holds on to the 3rd spot while Prulife of UK maintains its 2010 position as the 4th largest provider of life insurance in the Philippines. It is interesting to note that the revenue difference between AXA and PruLife is now only about 80 Million. Will we see changes in the 3rd and 4th ranking as well for 2011?

Insular holds its 2010 ranking of #5 but you will see that the Bancassurance partnership of BPI and Philamlife is closing in with only a 100 Million premium difference. The next 5 rankings are dominated by Bancassurance organizations which is an indication on how life insurance has been distributed in the past years.

2011 also shows the continuing shift of the types of life insurance being sold — from traditional policies to Variable Universal Life or Investment Linked plans. The deteriorating returns of interest rates seem to be a challenge for traditional life insurance plans to keep its marketability forcing buyers (and sellers) of life insurance to consider investment linked products even if they are not guaranteed.

While I’m ecstatic at the growth of the life insurance industry and I’m actually cheering on my friends in the industry, my issue has always been the same — there are not enough Filipinos with life insurance benefits. As of 2010, the Insurance Commission said that there are only 3.3 Million policies that remain in-force. 3.3 Million policies does not mean there are 3.3 Million Filipinos covered as many of those who buy life insurance will have multiple policies.  In the same report, the Insurance Commission disclosed that there were only about 315,000 new policies issued for the year 2010. My prayer is that growth in the life insurance industry should not just be limited to looking at premiums and we put the same passion into having more lives covered. Financial security given by a life insurance policy is very important to Filipinos as we are constantly faced with the uncertainties of life.

It’s great to see more and more life insurance companies taking a more active role in providing financial education which I believe is the real key to a sustainable growth for the whole industry. It’s just that we just need to do more, push more, teach more, advocate more and educate more.

My 2 cents.