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Kazakhstan Insurance Report 2008
Business Monitor International, June 2008, Pages: 32
BMI's Kazakhstan Insurance Report provides independent forecasts and competitive intelligence on Kazakhstan's insurance industry.
Key Insights On The Insurance Sector Of Kazakhstan With a population of just under 15mn and a booming energy sector, Kazakhstan should be prospective territory for the world’s insurers. Moreover, by the standards of Central and Eastern Europe (for the
purposes of comparative analysis, we include Kazakhstan in our Central and Eastern Europe region), there are other attractions. The political environment appears fairly stable. Overall country risk levels do not appear to be particularly worrying. Relative to other countries in the region, the absolute growth in non-life premiums that can be expected in 2007-2012 is quite large. This outcome does not require spectacular GDP growth or a massive rise in the non-life penetration.
On balance, though, it is the weaknesses of the Kazakh insurance sector that predominate. For one thing, life insurance hardly exists at all – even though per capita GDP already exceeds US$6,000. For another, the accumulative pension funds have amassed assets of just US$250mn or so and appear not to be growing. It is very difficult to escape the conclusion that Kazakhs have little faith in making long-term savings through local financial institutions. They may have a point. As we explain in this report, mounting economic imbalances – which relate to the country’s huge external debt and consequent exposure to the risk appetite of international investors – have caused a credit squeeze. The government has announced that it will set up a US$4bn fund to provide assistance to troubled banks. Various other aspects of Kazakhstan’s insurance sector suggest that it is very different to its counterparts in most countries in Central and Eastern Europe. For instance, Compulsory Third Party Motor Liability (CTPML) insurance, normally the first line to develop in an emerging insurance market, is unimportant. Instead, property insurance accounts for the overwhelming majority of the non-life segment in Kazakhstan. Moreover, the non-life segment is dominated by a relatively large number of local operations, many of which are tiny by world standards and none of which are large by international standards.
While the competitive landscape is not as bizarre as that of Ukraine (to take another example from the former USSR) or Nigeria (to consider another economy that is totally dominated by the energy sector), it is not easy to avoid the conclusion that regulations and/or the business environment of Kazakhstan is a significant barrier to entry. Quite unlike in Ukraine or the Baltic States, multinational insurers are thin on the ground in Kazakhstan. Global giant AIG has had a presence for a while, but is only a mid-rank player. Allianz entered the market in late 2007 by way of a small acquisition (of ATF Polis – from a bank that is owned by Italy’s Unicredito). Generali effectively entered Kazakhstan in early 2007 – but this was only because it entered into a joint venture with Èeská Poisovòa (the former state owned monopoly of the Czech Republic) which covers 12 countries across Central and Eastern Europe. Èeská Poisovòa had earlier established a life subsidiary in Kazakhstan. Other firms with aspirations in the region – such as the large French groups, Scandinavian financial services conglomerates, Germany’s ERGO and the major Austrian firms – are absent. So too are the enormous insurers that are based in the Asia Pacific region countries, which are, over the long term, potential buyers of Kazakh energy (and especially China).
Will this change if the credit crunch really begins to bite? On balance, we suspect not. Most of the larger players in Kazakhstan are doing business with the energy sector and, in some cases, may effectively be captive insurers. A lot of the risk is being passed on to reinsurers. Some of the smallest Kazakh firms may face problems but, collectively, their share of non-life premiums is small.
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