Azim tipped to be new PruBSN chief executive officer

PETALING JAYA: Prudential BSN Takaful Bhd (PruBSN) chief operating officer Azim Mithani will soon helm the company as chief executive officer pending Bank Negara approval.
The British-trained actuary is also currently treasurer of the Actuarial Society of Malaysia.
Before assuming his current position, Azim was chief financial officer and appointed actuary of Prudential Assurance Malaysia Bhd (PAMB).
Azim Mithani is a British-traine d actu ary.
A sister company of PAMB established in 2006, PruBSN is a 51:49 joint venture between Bank Simpanan Nasional Bhd and Prudential Holdings Ltd.
Many industry observers hailed PruBSN’s choice of Azim as a right one; as a qualified actuary and risk manager, he would be able to understand and assess risk effectively since risk was an important consideration in determining premiums.
As an actuary, he would be able to further instill and enhance the company’s risk management practices. This is in line with the regulatory changes in the insurance industry that placed greater focus on risk management.
It is learnt that Azim’s predecessor Mohamad Salihuddin Ahmad, who joined PruBSN in 2006, is now with Great Eastern Life Assurance (M) Bhd heading the project management team to secure a takaful licence for the company.
According to sources, Salihuddin was hand-picked by Great Eastern Holdings group chief executive officer Ng Keng Hooi to head its future Islamic insurance operations. He left PruBSN in August.
Talk is rife that Great Eastern Holdings Ltd, the parent of Great Eastern Life Malaysia, is a front runner to clinch one of two takaful licences to be awarded by Bank Negara later this year, in line with the financial services sector liberalisation.

About Essent

Essent Guaranty, Inc. is a member of the Essent Group Ltd. family of companies, which, through its subsidiaries, is preparing to offer private mortgage insurance and reinsurance coverage with respect to United States risks. The company has secured $500 million in equity funding from a group of experienced financial services investors, including Pine Brook Road Partners, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, PartnerRe, and Renaissance Re.
Essent's mission is to support homeownership for borrowers who can afford a home, but not a large down payment, by insuring mortgage lenders and investors from credit losses. The company will achieve this mission by providing private capital to take mortgage credit risk, and working as a risk management partner with lenders and other mortgage investors. The company's headquarters are in Radnor, Pennsylvania. Additional information may be found at

Triad Guaranty to Sell Mortgage Insurance Operating Platform to Essent Guaranty; Sale Benefits Triad Stakeholders and Supports New MI Entrant

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., Oct. 7 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Triad Guaranty Inc. (Nasdaq: TGIC) today announced that it has reached a definitive agreement to sell its information technology and operating platform to Essent Guaranty, Inc. ("Essent"), a new mortgage insurer founded to provide private capital to America's housing finance system.
Under the terms of the asset purchase agreement, Essent will acquire all of Triad's proprietary mortgage insurance software and substantially all of the supporting hardware, as well as certain other assets, in exchange for up to $30 million in cash and the assumption by Essent of certain software contractual obligations. Approximately $15 million of the consideration is fixed and up to an additional $15 million is contingent on Essent writing a certain minimum amount of insurance in future years. Triad will retain the obligation for all risks insured under its existing insurance contracts and will continue to pursue the voluntary run-off of its existing in-force book of business.
Essent, which is headquartered in Radnor, Pennsylvania, will establish its operations and technology center in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where Triad is based, and a number of Triad's information technology and operations employees are expected to join Essent upon closing of the transaction. As part of a services agreement between the two companies, Essent will provide ongoing information systems maintenance and services, customer service and policy administration support to Triad after the closing. Triad will continue to directly manage loss mitigation and claim activity during its run-off and will retain its personnel in the loss management, quality assurance and corporate areas to perform these functions.
"We believe that this is a very beneficial transaction for both Triad and Essent," said Ken Jones, president and chief executive officer of Triad. "While preserving our control over loss mitigation and claims processing to protect our policyholders during run-off, Triad stakeholders benefit from the proceeds generated by the sale of the platform and reduced costs to service our run-off book of business going forward. The platform, which we believe will benefit from Essent's ongoing maintenance and investment, provides Essent with the opportunity to enter the market utilizing an established operating platform and a seasoned team of mortgage insurance technology and operations professionals."
"The acquisition of Triad's operating platform is the next major step in the formation of Essent's mortgage insurance business, which is being created to support qualified borrowers who can afford a home, but may not have the funds for a large down payment," said Mark Casale, president and chief executive officer of Essent. "With this transaction, we can begin to provide mortgage insurance in the near future on a proven technology and operating platform in which our clients and regulators can have utmost confidence."
Casale added, "We're also pleased to be making excellent progress in the National Association of Insurance Commissioners' expedited licensing pilot program, and have received approvals from 20 states to date. With the benefit of a strong capital base, we are building a new company that we believe can meet our clients' mortgage insurance and risk management needs today, and for years to come."
The transaction is expected to close in the fourth calendar quarter of 2009.
About Triad
Triad Guaranty Inc.'s wholly owned subsidiary, Triad Guaranty Insurance Corporation, is a nationwide mortgage insurer pursuing a voluntary run-off of its existing in-force book of business. For more information, please visit the Company's website at www.tgic.com
This release includes "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements include estimates and assumptions related to economic, competitive, regulatory, operational and legislative developments and also include, but are not limited to, statements relating to the timing of the Asset Sale and satisfaction of conditions to the Asset Sale, subsequent payments related to the Asset Sale, future benefits and services, and future economic and industry conditions and are not historical facts and typically are identified by use of terms such as "may," "will," "should," "could," "expect," "plan," "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "predict," "potential," "continue" and similar words, although some forward-looking statements are expressed differently. These forward-looking statements are subject to change, uncertainty and circumstances that are, in many instances, beyond Triad's control and they have been made based upon Triad's current expectations and beliefs concerning future developments and their potential effect on Triad.
Actual developments and their results could differ materially from those expected by Triad depending on the outcome of a number of factors, including but not limited to: potential difficulties that may be encountered in closing the Asset Sale; potential uncertainties regarding market acceptance of the Asset Sale; uncertainties as to the timing of the Asset Sale and the satisfaction of other closing conditions to the Asset Sale, including the receipt of regulatory approvals; competitive responses to the Asset Sale; impact of current and future economic conditions on the Asset Sale; the possibility that the Illinois Department of Insurance may take various actions regarding Triad if it does not operate its business in accordance with its revised financial and operating plan and the corrective orders, including seeking receivership proceedings; Triad's ability to operate its business in run-off and maintain a solvent run-off; Triad's ability to continue as a going concern; the possibility of general economic and business conditions that are different than anticipated; legislative, regulatory and other similar developments; changes in interest rates, employment rates, the housing market, the mortgage industry and the stock market; and various factors described under "Risk Factors" and in the "Safe Harbor Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995" in Triad's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2008 and in other reports and statements filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Forward-looking statements are based upon Triad's current expectations and beliefs concerning future events and Triad undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect the impact of circumstances or events that arise after the date the forward-looking statements are made, other than as is required

‘People Risk’ Tough For ERM, Regulators To Manage

New York City—No matter how many regulations or internal fail-safe systems an organization or a government puts in place, preventing systemic economic collapses means challenging peoples’ worst instincts, an enterprise risk management conference was warned this week.
Following a wide-ranging panel discussion of the financial meltdown and its implications for corporate governance—entitled, “A Conversation About Risk: What Keeps You Up At Night?”—an audience member asked the experts to explain how companies and regulators can mitigate “people risk” to discourage behavior that is at best reckless, and at worst unethical or even illegal, when the specter of large profits loom.
“One of the clear weaknesses here is people,” said the attendee at the ERM conference put together by the events division of The National Underwriter Company, part of Summit Business Media. “How do you get board buy-in to proceed with caution on risk? How do you mitigate the inherent ‘people risk’?”

“There is a natural human reluctance when things are going well to challenge the status quo,” said Helen Galt, senior vice president, actuary and chief risk officer at Prudential Financial Inc. “Even though some of the markets were defying the laws of gravity, people were reluctant to miss the boat. More attention should have been paid to nightmare scenarios.”
She said CROs need to “challenge management to define their risk tolerance more clearly.”
Ms. Galt later added that collateralized debt obligations packaging subprime mortgages were “embraced because of the high ratings assigned to them by rating agencies”—a level of trust and confidence that turned out to be misplaced.
She suggested that “if you can develop your own internal capabilities to analyze these complex products, you must do so. But if you find you need 300-page documents to fully explain how the product works, it’s probably too complicated.”
Ms. Galt said her firm “basically decided we were not going to invest in CDOs. After they were sliced and diced multiple times, it was hard to understand what we were looking at.”

europe insurance

I would expect much less than the UK, as the plans in Germany are generally not funded and thus no Trustee type work which is good for the pension consulting business. Annual valuations need to be done but these are for tax purposes and of course for International accounting purposes.
"Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm -- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves."

Cat Bond Market Set for Active Fourth Quarter, Reports Guy Carpenter

The report by Guy Carpenter & Co., LLC, and GC Securities, a division of MMC Securities Corp. concludes that a number of trends are converging that could result in a total of between $3 billion and $4 billion of issuance in 2009. These include an increase in risk capital and the recent upsizing of catastrophe bonds in the third quarter of 2009.
According to the briefing, new risk capital issued in the third quarter of 2009 rose 28.8 percent compared with the third quarter of 2008. Two transactions, both closed in July 2009, resulted in $412 million of new risk capital issued, up from $320 million during the second quarter of 2008. For the first three quarters of 2009, a total of 11 catastrophe bonds have been issued, accounting for $1.79 billion in risk capital. Year-to-date issuance activity has been down 33.5 percent versus the same period in 2008.
FOURTH QUARTER 2009 OUTLOOKImprovement in global financial market conditions improving and advances in the insurance-linked securities (ILS) collateral solutions ⦣8364;" coupled with a stronger demand for issuance and the increasing capacity of investors ⦣8364;" have resulted in a shift in the ILS market relative to the beginning of 2009.
Investors are increasingly focusing on capital deployment and stimulating additional primary issuance, which is contributing to spread tightening, according to the report.
"Given the increase in risk capital and the performance of the two bonds issued in the third quarter ⦣8364;" both in terms of pricing and size ⦣8364;" a fourth quarter that would account for more than 40 percent of the year's total issuance is not unattainable," said David Priebe, chairman of Global Client Development, Guy Carpenter. "Redemptions resulting from cat bonds maturing and a fairly light Atlantic hurricane season should also increase demand for new issuance."
The consensus estimate for 2009 total issuance remains from $3 billion to $4 billion, implying a fourth quarter issuance rate of $1.2 billion to $2.2 billion.
"The recent tightening of spreads has brought the ILS market back, after the unusually wide spread we saw in the first half of 2009 had a dampening effect on issuance activity, particularly from reinsurers," said Chi Hum, global head of distribution, GC Securities. "Sponsors that had been hesitant to enter the market during the first half of 2009 because of pricing concerns may now renew their interest in catastrophe bonds, since the benefits of cat bond protection are available at more favorable price points."
THIRD QUARTER ACTIVITYParkton Re Ltd., on which GC Securities acted as co-lead manager and joint bookrunner, was upsized and ultimately priced below its initial price guidance. The initial target placement of $125 million resulted in a $200 million transaction. The North Carolina Joint Underwriting Association and North Carolina Insurance Underwriting Association (NC JUA/IUA), a new entrant to the catastrophe bond market, sponsored Parkton Re. The bond covers North Carolina hurricane losses based on an indemnity trigger.
The Eurus II Ltd. transaction, which closed a day later, was also upsized to EUR150 million (from EUR75 million). The bond, which covers European windstorm risk in Germany, the United Kingdom, Netherlands, France, Belgium, Denmark and Ireland, replaced Eurus Ltd, a $150 million bond that matured on April 8, 2009.
CATASTROPHE BOND REDEMPTIONSIn addition to new bonds issued, $300 million of catastrophe bond risk capital matured in the third quarter of 2009, bringing the year-to-date total to $2.54 billion.
A total of $660 million is scheduled to mature during the fourth quarter of this year.
RISK CAPITAL OUTSTANDINGFollowing consecutive quarters of declines, total risk capital outstanding increased from the second quarter of 2009 to the third quarter, reaching $11.3 billion ⦣8364;" up from $11.19 billion ⦣8364;" a net increase of $112 million (1 percent).
The current level of risk capital outstanding is consistent with that of mid-year 2007.
ISSUANCE COMPOSITION$200 million of the $412 million issued in the third quarter of 2009 had U.S. hurricane exposure, while the remainder had exposure to European windstorm.

European Actuaries Makes Proposal For Solvency II Standards

In a move to ensure greater protection for policyholders, without inhibiting innovation and market development, The Groupe Consultatif Actuariel Européen (the Groupe) make proposals for Solvency II professional standards.
Reportedly, the majority of those who will carry out the actuarial function under Solvency II, will be qualified actuaries and members of the professional actuarial bodies which make up the Groupe.
The Groupe proposes that there should be two main categories of standards: 1) public interest standards and 2) technical standards. Public interest standards would include qualification standards, ethical standards, governance standards and communication standards. Technical standards would include interpretative standards and technical implementation standards.
Caroline Instance, chief executive of The UK Actuarial Profession, said: “The Groupe’s submission considers the various stages of the process of setting, implementing and enforcing standards and makes some suggestions on how these responsibilities might be allocated. The paper acknowledges that the issues involved in setting a full range of public interest and technical standards are far-reaching and complex. The paper also notes that, currently, there is a wide diversity within Europe of types of standards and arrangements for setting them, with differing roles for the professional bodies, supervisors or regulators and new public interest bodies such as the BAS in the UK.
“We consider that the implications of the Groupe’s submission for the UK should be considered collectively by the FSA, the FRC and the UK Profession and we shall be taking this forward with our colleagues in these organisations.”

Insurance vs Consulting. Is all insurance work excel based?

have had a summer internship at a P&C firm and then I worked in a pension consulting firm, then I worked in a health insurance firm. From my experience and what I've heard from friends in the industry, insurance work seems to be a lot of basic work in excel - copy/pasting, inputting numbers from last year into a spreadsheet and applying an arbitrary inflation rate. Maybe you even start integrating the excel numbers into a document.No offense to anyone but this is is work that the admin did in the pension consulting field. I thoroughly enjoyed the work I did in consulting - it was quantitative, I learned a lot and I felt "active" whereas in the insurance jobs, I felt like I took all these advanced actuarial exams to sit there and do deadbeat work. I have a feeling that life insurance is a bit different. I'm now looking for a job. And I'm on the fence.I want a job with decent hours and I don't want to go running after clients demands (consulting). But I don't want a deadbeat, boring, excel inputting number job (insurance). Question:Do other people have this experience with insurance jobs? Did you work on programming/testing models? What industry and/or company did you work for?Also, does it look bad at an interview or to recruiters to ask about this? how quantitative is the job? How do I say "I don't want to be inputting number into excel all day" in a polite and professional way?Thanks for any input

submit in insurance

The Summit will explore untapped potential of as much as 400% within the Middle East insurance market through a full programme of speeches, panel sessions, clinics and workshops that encourage open discussion between delegates and expert panellists and speakers.A recent report has shown that average insurance penetration in the relatively small and undeveloped Middle East market stands at just 1.5%, despite having grown faster during the last decade than any other region in the world. The global average of 7.1% penetration is almost five times as great, suggesting there is room for significant growth in the region. The same report also shows that the total insurance premiums in the Middle East & Central Asia grew by 4.7% in 2008, compared to a global decline of 2.0%, further emphasising the opportunities.Debo Ajayi, Summit Chairman and Managing Director and Consulting Actuary, Milliman Dubai Office, said:

submit in insurance

The Summit will explore untapped potential of as much as 400% within the Middle East insurance market through a full programme of speeches, panel sessions, clinics and workshops that encourage open discussion between delegates and expert panellists and speakers.A recent report has shown that average insurance penetration in the relatively small and undeveloped Middle East market stands at just 1.5%, despite having grown faster during the last decade than any other region in the world. The global average of 7.1% penetration is almost five times as great, suggesting there is room for significant growth in the region. The same report also shows that the total insurance premiums in the Middle East & Central Asia grew by 4.7% in 2008, compared to a global decline of 2.0%, further emphasising the opportunities.Debo Ajayi, Summit Chairman and Managing Director and Consulting Actuary, Milliman Dubai Office, said:

Flooding, earthquakes and typhoons

While inland flooding is currently the least costly peril from an insurance perspective, as it mainly affects poorer rural communities, it is also the most widespread hazard, affecting one in four people every year.Earthquakes and typhoons have the potential to create the largest insurance losses. For Milan Simic, managing director of AIR Worldwide Ltd, the two most costly scenarios are either a typhoon making landfall in Shanghai or an earthquake affecting Beijing.“Typhoons in China and the whole of Asia are quite different from their relatives, the hurricanes in the US. They tend to cause significant losses from precipitation. So in our China model we have two hazard models – one wind and one precipitation.”In 2007, Super Typhoon Wipha led to mass evacuation as it moved worryingly close to Shanghai.This year, Typhoon Morakot became Taiwan’s worst storm in 50 years, leading to 500 deaths and economic losses around TWD100bn ($2.9bn) before moving on to China’s Zhejiang province with more torrential rain. Alishan station in Chiayi County, in the southern part of Taiwan, recorded nearly 2,800mm of precipitation.While last year’s Sichuan Earthquake was a human disaster (killing over 70,000 people), insurance losses were relatively small (at $1bn according to AIR) due to the low insurance penetration in the region.“If insurance penetration were to increase in Asia and specifically in China, you could easily see the country becoming a peak zone for many insurance and reinsurance companies,” says Simic.“There is a high potential for earthquake activity around Beijing, which from an insurance point of view is the highest zone for concentration so it’s really those Beijing events that we have to keep an eye on,” he adds

Insurance modelling

While China has a long earthquake record, there remain plenty of challenges in properly understanding the country’s hazards. “China is the longest uninterrupted civilisation on earth and they pride themselves in having the longest historical earthquake catalogue. So from that point of view the information is good but on the other hand the information is not publicly available.”Language barriers are part of the problem. “Most of the main publications were written in Mandarin and we therefore have to rely on our Chinese speakers and partner with local organisations to help us build the models and understand the hazard,” says Simic.Another issue is the resolution of the data. Earlier this year, CRESTA [Catastrophe Risk Evaluation and Standardizing Target Accumulations] created new and more specific zones for China, increasing the number of zones from 60 to over 2,400. But this is still a long way from being able to assess risk at a street or zip code level.Primary insurers are becoming more sophisticated in their approach to catastrophes, but the market lacks a unified approach, explains Robert Wiest, Swiss Re’s managing director for China.“Given the relatively short history of insurance in China, market players here have different and sometimes highly different definitions for cat events. For instance, flood, snow storm and typhoon are often defined differently by different insurers, who then have different views on claims.”Wiest thinks recent cat events will help to drive awareness of insurance, as well as improve the industry’s approach to covering catastrophes.“The recent cat events have significantly increased the public awareness for insurance, which is important in driving insurance take up. The events also made the (re)insurance sector to take a further look at how to manage nat cat risks, which will help the industry to take up more risks.“Having said that,” he continues, “one has to be realistic that it will take some time for China to see insurance playing a more important role in taking nat cat risks, as decision-making is not purely from the insurance sector.”

A massive appetite: Insuring China

Despite the global economic downturn, the growth of China’s insurance market continues. Total premiums grew a massive 31.3% between 2007 and 2008, according to Swiss Re (40.9% and 14.8% for life and non-life insurance respectively).As insurance take-up increases, the assets at risk from natural hazards also grow in value. With cities such as Shanghai and Beijing exposed to typhoons and earthquakes, many insurance experts think China will become a major “peak zone” in just a matter of years.“I think China is going to become a major peak and probably the peak in the world, just simply because China is so big,” says James Few, managing director of Aspen Re. “There are cities of 20 million people in China that Western insurance professionals have often never heard of – it is an enormous place.“China is vulnerable to just about every type of peril you can think of,” he continues. “With so much value, so many people and a growing economy, you would naturally assume that insurance penetration rates are going to rise in the five to ten year timeframe.”

INSURANCE OF MAN

Melvin M. Hurwitz was born in Brooklyn in 1917. He passed away on Monday, at age 92. During his life, he watched his borough change, but he himself did not change much. He was stubborn that way.
“It’s different when you’re someone that comes out of the Great Depression,” his son, Kenneth G. Hurwitz, 57, said on Thursday. “He lived life on his own terms.”
In the mid-1970s, Mr. Hurwitz moved his insurance agency from its original location on Broadway in Williamsburg, where he had first opened it in 1952, to a storefront on Court Street in downtown Brooklyn Heights, where it remains to this day.

Be Concerned - When in an Accident

As with any case concerning health, with auto insurance, your priority should always be the welfare of all people involved irregardless of who is at fault. The auto is covered by the insurance policy (if you do have insurance) as well as most of the early costs that can be incurred in the accident and the immediate aftermath. More serious accidents will surely get the involvement of the police but minor fender-benders can be resolved between the two drivers concerned. In some states, the police should be informed of any accident where damage is estimated to exceed a certain limit as defined by law or if somebody has been hurt as a result of the accident, may they be a passenger, driver or innocent bystander who was hit and suffered

The Benefits of Low Cost Car Insurance CoverageBy

Indemnity coverage has already become a must these days, with accidents and mishaps taking place here and there. Come to think of it, there is no way you can predict something from happening, or telling whether or not something will take place. This is the reason why most government vehicle departments and registries already require compulsory injury arrangements for the benefit of vehicle owners and the public.
Normally, it takes a lot of money to avail of these arrangements for something that may not take place, and even more to continue being placed under the program. This makes a lot of people hesitant to even consider availing of a policy. Fortunately, we already have a lot of low cost car insurance arrangements that can make this necessity less burdensome and more practical for car owners as well as operators from all walks of life.
Low cost car insurance programs are given out by companies both for purposes of allowing car owners to be secure in their safety and property, and for them to continue doing business; especially during times of economic recession and financial difficulty. One benefit is that programs like this allow payment of premiums to be made on an installment basis, albeit on a much wider latitude or within a longer span of time. This will mean that policyholders will have a longer time to pay premiums and in lesser sums as well. This is an advantageous result since most insurance contracts are already perfected even though there has not yet been a full premium payment.
Another benefit is that owners can already consider having the contract cancelled if he does not wish to continue with the coverage. Low cost car insurance is made more convenient such that even if losses will take place, it will not be substantial so policyholders can decide to cancel his present contract, also known as the policy, and avail of a new one from a different provider. This way, no one is compelled to stay covered by one company for a time longer than he wants to. For the protection of insurers, a light penalty is deducted from refund of premiums paid, if any.
A trend in the past is that only the wealthy are able to avail of indemnity arrangements since they have money to spare. It is indeed fortunate for those in the lower economic bracket that companies have come up with schemes to allow the middle and lower classes to avail of low cost car insurance. This is to say that road and car safety and security is available to everyone regardless of status or class.

INSURANCE IN ASIA

Looming largest in the pipeline is AIA, the Asian arm of American International Group (AIG.N), which plans a Hong Kong IPO in the first half of 2010 to raise roughly $4 billion after its troubled parent failed to find a buyer for the unit.
Shanghai-listed China Pacific Insurance 601602.SS, meanwhile, aims to raise $3.5 billion in Hong Kong by early 2010.
The potential wave of issuance comes as IPOs make a comeback around Asia and as rising stock markets lift earnings for life insurers, for whom investment returns are a key source of income. The need for capital to fund expansion is another driver.
"There's a lot of pent-up demand for capital, as insurers need to raise capital to fund growth and meet new risk-based capital requirements," said Chin Yee-Png, co-head of the Asia financial institutions group at UBS (UBSN.VX).
UBS is among the investment banks, along with China International Capital Corp (CICC), Credit Suisse (CSGN.VX) and Goldman Sachs (GS.N), helping China Pacific, the country's No.3 life insurer, to revive an overseas share sale that had been shelved earlier due to weak markets.
SCARCITY, GROWTH
Scarcity value is expected to drive investor interest in a sector that is a proxy for the growth of the middle class.
Asia is home to just a handful of big listed insurers, led by China Life Insurance (2628.HK)(LFC.N)(601628.SS) and rival Ping An Insurance (2318.HK)(601318.SS), the world's two most valuable life insurers, and Taiwan's Cathay Financial Holdings (2882.TW).
"There's no way of playing the Indian insurance story today, so I think there's going to be very strong demand. This is part of a broader regional trend," said Rob Jesudason, Asia head of the financial institutions group at Credit Suisse.
"There are potentially 5-10 very large insurance IPOs across the region approaching the market," he said.
Esther Chwei, a portfolio analyst covering insurance and banking at fund manager RCM, a unit of Allianz Global Investors, said China and India, with fast-growing economies and low insurance penetration rates, are especially attractive.
Life insurance penetration in India is about 4 percent of GDP, in terms of total premiums underwritten in a year, compared with 2.4 percent in China and about 13.5 percent in the UK.
"For China and India, once people get wealthier and have financial obligations, the demand for protection policies will increase," said Chwei, whose firm manages $11 billion in the Asia-Pacific region