Kyobo Life Insurance has secured the industry's top-tier credit rating from Moody's, one of the world's three major credit rating agencies, reaffirming its financial soundness.
Kyobo Life said Thursday it received an A1 credit rating in Moody's Insurance Financial Strength (IFS) assessment. After becoming the first domestic life insurer to receive a Moody's A1 rating in 2015, the company has now maintained the rating for 12 consecutive years.
The A1 rating is awarded to companies that demonstrate strong financial soundness and risk management capabilities even amid external uncertainties such as a global economic slowdown and heightened financial market volatility. Moody's cited Kyobo Life's strengths as its excellent sales competitiveness centered on captive agents, stable profitability, and sound capital adequacy.
In its report, Moody's said, "Kyobo Life is steadily maintaining high profitability by expanding sales of protection-type insurance based on its strong captive agent organization," adding that "the company is demonstrating robust capital adequacy backed by growth in new business contractual service margin (CSM)."
Moody's also positively assessed the company's strategic product diversification and risk management capabilities, noting that "the proportion of high-interest fixed-rate contracts is gradually decreasing, and the product portfolio is improving with a focus on health protection insurance and long-term payment whole life insurance."
Moody's projected that Kyobo Life would continue to maintain stable profitability, capital adequacy, and a strong market position going forward, assigning a rating outlook of "Stable."
Kyobo Life maintains the industry's top-tier credit ratings from global and domestic credit rating agencies. Earlier this year, it received an "A+" rating from global credit rating agency Fitch for the 14th consecutive year, and last month it received the highest "AAA" rating in the insurance financial strength assessments of Korea's three major credit rating agencies.
Kyobo Life has continued steady growth despite uncertain domestic and external conditions. In the first quarter of this year, it recorded net profit of 330.1 billion won (on a separate basis), driven by improved investment income and strong sales of protection-type insurance. Its solvency ratio under the Korean Insurance Capital Standard (K-ICS), applying transitional measures, stood at 214.2%.
A Kyobo Life official said, "Maintaining the Moody's A1 rating is the result of having our financial soundness and risk management capabilities recognized even amid financial market volatility and tightening regulations," adding, "We will continue sustainable growth based on stable profit generation and preemptive risk management."
