Retakaful business

We write retakaful business – that is to say, insurance transacted in accordance with Islamic law – in both Southeast Asia and on the Arabian Peninsula. With the Bahrain-based Hannover ReTakaful we maintain a subsidiary that bears exclusive responsibility for transacting this line of business; we also have a local branch that writes traditional reinsurance in the Arab world.

The economic crisis led to an overall slowdown in construction work and put a stop to infrastructure measures. The premium volume generated by primary insurers consequently grew less strongly. This, in turn, had implications for reinsurers. We nevertheless succeeded in boosting our gross premium volume. Yet our company does not aspire primarily to growth targets or market shares; rather, our focus is on the profitability of the business. Our largest single market is Saudi Arabia.

The year under review passed off very well for our company: despite rising competition we were able to increase our premium volume in casualty business and the engineering lines. The successful growth of our retakaful business can be attributed to the very good relations that we cultivate with our clients, our quick response times and the financial standing of Hannover Re.

Even though the result of our retakaful business in the year under review fell somewhat short of the previous year’s performance, we are not dissatisfied with its development.