Swiss Life: Good start in 2017 for insurance company

Swiss Life had a «good start» to the year 2017, with fee revenue of 340 million Swiss francs, an increase of 5% compared with the same period a year ago. Premiums dropped 1% to 6.5 billion francs, the company said in a statement today. Five analysts polled by Reuters had on average expected gross premiums to fall 1.3 percent to 6.595 billion francs.
"Swiss Life has made a good start to the year," Chief Financial Officer Thomas Buess said in a statement. "We also managed to increase fee income and assets under management in the first quarter of 2017. That shows we are continuing our progress toward implementing our group-wide program 'Swiss Life 2018'."

Switzerland's biggest life insurer has focused on trimming costs and raising asset management and investment income to compensate sluggishness in its core life insurance business.

Like other insurers, Swiss Life — whose main markets include Switzerland, France and Germany — has been squeezed by low and even negative interest rates.

In Switzerland, the company’s home market, premiums dropped 7%. The company said it was selective in signing new full insurances. The share of new business with part-autonomous solutions increased to 18% and growth with private clients was 8 percent. The business abroad yielded growth across the board.
The group in March announced Chief Executive Patrick Frost would be taking a sabbatical until mid-August to undergo treatment for cancer, with Buess leading operations in the interim.