Planning for IPO? IRDAI to revise guidelines soon for insurance firms

Revised IPO guidelines will be issued soon for insurers as some of them are keep to tap this route, regulator IRDAI Chairman T S Vijayan said on Wednesday while pegging the total foreign investment in sector at Rs 15,000 crore in the last one year due to increase in FDI limit.

Vijayan said the total investment of of more than Rs 15,000 crore has come to India in various forms -- mostly equity -- since the passage of the Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill last year. The bill, passed in March 2015, raised the foreign investment cap in the sector from 26% to 49%.

Addressing a press conference here, Vijayan said there may be some more investments in the pipeline. On the insurance sector business last fiscal, Vijayan said there was 12% growth in life insurance and 14% growth in non-life insurance, while the health insurance sector grew by 40%.

"Business has been good for all insurance companies in April. If this trend continues, we can expect higher growth in financial year 2016-17 also in life, non-life and health," he added.

Vijayan said health insurance penetration is very low in India and there is potential for higher growth. On regulations for IPOs by insurance companies, he said the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) may bring in some changes in the guidelines for the companies wanting to dilute equity.

"I am not very sure. I think there are one or two companies wanting to go for IPO. I do not know whether they have applied for clearance I do not know," Vijayan said when asked about the names of the companies that are planning to go for equity dilution.

"We started working on some changes in the existing norms for IPO. In a month or so we will come out with those norms," he explained.

HDFC Standard Life recently announced plans to launch its Initial Public Offer (IPO) wherein parent HDFC Ltd would sell 10% stake. Besides, ICICI Prudential also plans to launch an IPO.

Meanwhile, Insurance Information Bureau of India said it is hosting 'IIRFA-2016', the Annual Conclave of Insurance Information and Ratemaking Forum of Asia here on May 26-27.

R Raghavan, CEO of IIB said IIRFA is a pan-Asian body of Insurance analytics and rate-making bodies and its annual conclave is held in a different member country each year. This year, it is being held in India, hosted by IIB.