Total premiums of Generali CEE at EUR 1.8 billion

– In spite of an extremely challenging environment the Generali Group’s operations in ten countries of the Central Eastern Europe region continued its very successful development in the first half of 2015, the company said in a release.

In CEE the Group closed the first six months with an excellent operating result of € 253 million (+1.7%) as well as a strong premium income. Gross written premiums increased by 5.7% to € 1,828 million showing an upward trend in both segments Life and P&C (property and casualty).

In the Life segment the premium income grew significantly by 9.6% to € 813 million with a strong development in most of the main markets thanks to the excellent performance of the protection (+14.5%) and unit linked policies (+26.1%). Furthermore single premiums experienced a significant growth (+73.3%), in particular in the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia.

Also in the P&C insurance lines the Group’s CEE companies improved their performance once again. Gross written premiums grew by 2.8% to €1,015 million, thanks both to motor (+4.9%) - in particular in motor third party liability (MTPL) insurance with a growth of 7.5% - and non-motor (+0.9%) lines.

The CEE countries confirmed once again as the best Group’s region in terms of technical profitability with an extremely low combined ratio of 85.4%.

- We are very satisfied with the development of our Group in the first half of 2015. We have leading market positions in the Czech Republic and Hungary, in Serbia and Slovakia we are number 2 and number 3 - said Generali CEE Regional Officer Luciano Cirina.

More than 90% of the Group’s business in the CEE region is done in five markets – Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Serbia/Montenegro - whereas Romania, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Croatia account for less than 10% of total gross written premiums.