Despite the Covid-19 pandemic wreaking havoc on almost all the industrial sectors of the world, Taiwan’s non-life insurance industry continued to grow in 2020, registering a 6.2 percent increase and reaching $6.8 billion, according to statistics released by the Taiwan Insurance Institute. The motor insurance businesses accounted for 54 percent of the total non-life insurance in premium volume.
2019 registered a growth of 6.96 percent primarily due to an increase in fire insurance and automobile insurance. While the 2020 numbers were a little lower, we also need to keep in mind that it was affected due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Coming to motor insurance, the total number of premiums generated in 2020 reached NT101.6 billion. It registered an overall increase of 7.32 percent, compared to 2019. Premium income from voluntary automobile insurance grew by 8.8 percent year-to-year in 2020 while compulsory automobile insurance increased marginally by 1.1 percent.
As experts have pointed out, there are two major reasons for the growth in automobile insurance in 2020. Firstly, the premium rate of voluntary third-party liability insurance registered an increase and the Taiwan government did a good job at containing the Covid-19 pandemic, which contributed to stable motor sales.
New motor sales increased to 457,000 in 2020 from 439,000 in 2019 and imported vehicles saw an increasing share of Taiwan’s auto market. In 2020, the non-life insurance companies reported an earned net loss ratio of 56.6 percent. Compared to 2019, the sector registered an increase of 0.3 percent with 56.3 percent. The net income posted by the non-life sector reached NT14.8 billion in 2020, which is 8.1 percent higher than in 2019.