Chinese insurers will be allowed to invest in the listed and unlisted equities of domestic banks, the latest move to expand insurance companies' investment channels, the chairman of the regulator told a recent symposium.

Relevant policies have been approved by the State Council and will be released soon, said Wu Dingfu, chairman of the China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC) at the Beijing-Tianjin Insurance Symposium.

The move, together with a package of policies recently put into effect by the CIRC, follows a trend of strengthened co-operation among the country's insurance, banking and securities sectors.

In April, the central bank permitted qualified insurers to purchase foreign exchange for investment in products with fixed returns abroad.

Wu said that the quota for overseas investment by insurance companies would be lifted to 15 per cent of their total assets.

And the proportion of insurance companies' actual stock investment to their total assets will be boosted from the previous 1 per cent to 4 per cent.

The move is also expected to enhance co-operation between insurers and banks.

"We support insurance companies' buying into, or even taking controlling stakes, in well-managed, profitable banks that have a strong customer base," Wu Dingfu said.

Ping An Insurance, China's second-largest life insurer, is bidding for a 60 per cent stake in Shenzhen Commercial Bank through its investment arm Ping An Trust & Investment Co Ltd.

"But the investment ratio that insurers can put into banks will not be high," Hao Yansu, an insurance professor with the Central University of Finance and Economics, told China Daily.

The attraction for insurers investing in unlisted companies lies in the considerable investment premium, experts said.

"Once a bank floats its shares successfully, an insurance company (that has invested in the bank) will rake in a high return," said Wang, a capital management centre employee at a middle-sized insurance company.

However, as the industry watchdog hasn't yet revealed the details of the regulations, most insurance companies are taking a cautious approach.

"The policy loosening doesn't mean that insurance capital will rush into banks," said Wang. "The quality of banks is the decisive factor."

For insurance companies that attach more attention to quick returns, investing in unlisted banks and buying banks' new shares are better choices. For those that are more interested in long-term bancassurance co-operation, listed banks with a separated stake structure would be preferable, such as the Minsheng Bank, Merchants Bank and Huaxia Bank.

According to Liu Mingkang, chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), commercial banks will be allowed to set up insurance businesses.

"We support a more comprehensive co-operation between commercial banks and insurance companies in terms of cross-sector sales and agent business," Liu said in a statement posted on the CBRC website.

The banking regulator is drawing up rules with the central bank and the insurance regulator to allow broader scope for lenders in terms of insurance and brokerage businesses, Liu added.

Banks are currently allowed to sell policies for insurance companies and securities funds for brokerages,.

Under the new policies, insurers no longer need to park most of their assets in low-yield government bonds and bank deposits, while their investment returns should improve.

Statistics from the CIRC revealed that Chinese insurers had about 1.6 trillion yuan (US$200 billion) in gross assets by the end of February. The average return on investment of China's insurers is expected to rise from 3.5 per cent in 2005 to 5 per cent in 2006.

Source: China Daily