Property/Casualty Primary Insurance
Key figures: Property/Casualty Primary Insurance 1)
| 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 2) |
Figures in EUR million |
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Gross written premium | 6,012 | 5,632 | 3,507 | 5,383 | 5,611 |
Net premium earned | 3,709 | 3,783 | 2,116 | 2,361 | 2,171 |
Underwriting result | –39 | 207 | 184 | –13 | –22 |
Net investment income | 482 | 389 | 225 | 245 | 338 3) |
Operating result (EBIT) | 240 | 339 | 340 | 104 | 409 3) |
Combined ratio (net) in % | 99.8 4) | 92.7 4) | 91.3 | 100.6 | 90.7 |
1) The years 2005, 2004 and 2003 are of only limited comparability due to changes in segment allocation 2) On the basis of US GAAP 3) Including extraordinary income of EUR 156 million from the sale 4) Excluding life insurance business of the Italian subsidiary | |||||
Following the successful integration of the Gerling companies under company law, which was completed as planned in the fall of 2007, the Property/Casualty Primary Insurance segment presented itself with a new look – namely as the HDI-Gerling non-life group. On 24 September the merger of Gerling-Konzern Allgemeine Versicherungs-AG (GKA) with HDI Industrie Versicherung AG was entered in the Hannover Commercial Register.
At the same time, HDI Service AG and HDI Industrie Versicherung AG were superseded by HDI-Gerling Sach Serviceholding AG and HDI-Gerling Industrie Versicherung AG respectively. This was following by renaming of HDI Direkt Versicherung AG, HDI-Gerling Firmen und Privat Versicherung AG and HDI-Gerling Rechtsschutz Versicherung AG. HDI-Gerling Sach Serviceholding AG functions as an intermediate holding company and – as a wholly owned subsidiary of Talanx AG – now holds directly or indirectly all participating interests in the segment.
While integration activities in the segment have been concluded from the standpoint of company law, there is still some work to do on the operational level. Completion of the entire integration is therefore scheduled for the fall of 2008 – a relatively short space of time considering that operational integration in the non-life sector was not able to commence until mid-2007. It was only in May 2007 that Talanx secured a settlement with the plaintiffs who had taken legal action against the squeeze-out resolution of the GKA General Meeting on 20 September 2006.
The success of the Gerling integration in industrial insurance, the area with the greatest overlaps, is borne out especially impressively by the number of industrial clients that have remained loyal to the company: as was also true of the 2006/2007 renewal phase in industrial business, the 2007/2008 renewals demonstrated clients’ commitment to the new company HDI-Gerling Industrie Versicherung AG. In insurance business with major corporate groups HDI-Gerling Industrie lost its lead role on only two out of 285 accounts, while of the 500 most important Gerling clients among mid-sized enterprises there was just one cancellation on the policyholder’s side. The integration-related contraction in premiums in industrial insurance was in the order of a mere 5%, and it was just 1.8% in relation to all business sectors. The favorable development in the eyes of clients is convincingly borne out by a global survey of commercial insurance purchasers conducted this year by the magazine "Euromoney": HDI-Gerling was chosen as "Best industrial insurer in Germany".