Great Eastern Q4 profit jumps 79% to $241.4 million
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For full-year 2025, Great Eastern saw a 21 per cent rise in net profit to $1.2 billion.
ST PHOTO: KUA CHEE SIONG
SINGAPORE – Great Eastern posted a 79 per cent surge in net profit to $241.4 million for its fourth quarter ended December, from $134.8 million in the year-ago period.
The improvement was driven mainly by favourable investment performance and further supported by continued earnings emergence from existing in-force portfolio, said OCBC Bank’s insurance arm on Feb 24.
For financial year 2025, Great Eastern posted a net profit of $1.2 billion, an increase of 21 per cent from $995.3 million in FY2024. This was attributed to robust investment results from the shareholders’ fund, supported by continued earnings emergence from its in-force portfolio.
For FY2025, profit from the shareholders’ fund surged 48 per cent on the year to $390.9 million from $264.6 million.
For the fourth quarter, new business embedded value (NBEV) rose 25 per cent on the year to $241 million, from $193.4 million. NBEV for FY2025 climbed 19 per cent to $739.7 million, from $621.5 million.
The insurer noted that NBEV growth remained “robust”, despite a decline in total weighted new sales (TWNS). It was supported by an improved sales mix and strong sales performance in Singapore amid new product innovations introduced during the year, and channel growth from financial advisers and bancassurance.
Great Eastern said it reshaped its product mix for Singapore, broadening its suite of solutions and deepening customer engagement. This included the launch of 18 products, including several market-first offerings.
TWNS for the fourth quarter stood at $453.7 million, up 5 per cent from $432.7 million in the year-ago period. However, full-year TWNS declined 15 per cent to $1.5 billion, from $1.8 billion.
The decline was in line with a “strategic shift away from short-term single-premium products towards a more diversified range of longer-term product offerings”, said the insurer.
The board declared a final dividend of 30 cents per share for the financial year ended December, versus a final dividend of 45 cents for the year prior.
Together with the interim dividend of 25 cents per share, paid in September, total dividends for FY2025 amounted to 55 cents per share – subject to approval at Great Eastern’s annual general meeting on April 14.
Great Eastern shares were down 0.3 per cent, or three cents, at $15.93 at 9.22am. The stock closed up 1.1 per cent the previous day. THE BUSINESS TIMES
