Constantin Toma, head of Omniasig, the second-largest company on the insurance market, says the shareholders of insurance companies are set to pay the highest price for the current disastrous state of the market, caused by massive losses on the car insurance segment, and the amount of money evaporating.
"Optimistically, I think the losses registered by the car insurance segment will amount to 100-150 million euros. The first to pay the price will be the shareholders, who pumped tens of millions of euros into companies, which is wasted money. How are we supposed to recover this capital without profit?" questions Toma.
Last year, the shareholders of insurance companies performed capital increases worth around 130 million euros, as 96 million euros were "pumped" into insurance companies during the first 9 months of this year. The amount will continue to rise, with Omniasig having recently announced a 30 million-euro capital increase, which is destined to other Vienna Insurance group companies, such as Unita and Omniasig Life.
"Because of the losses, the shareholders have been, are and will continue to be forced to increase their share capital. Shockingly, insurance companies have come to the point where they have share capitals equal to, or even higher than banks, but register mediocre results," states Toma.
The shareholders with the largest share capital on the market include Astra-Uniqa (around 55 million euros), Ardaf (54 million euros), Omniasig (60 million euros), Aviva Asigurari de Viata (around 40 million euros), Generali (36 million euros), Unita (almost 33 million euros) and Asirom (18.6 million euros).
The head of Omniasig believes insurers have become "puppets" for those who try to turn a profit as quickly as possible, by capitalising on market growth and on foreign investors' interest in Romania.
"We are now merely puppets at the hands of those who have access to this industry. They are primarily shareholders who have discovered that Romania is a place where one can make a lot of money from insurance, by increasing the company's market share and then selling it at a price regulated by the volume of premiums. The experiment has been well received by potential buyers eager to enter the Romanian market, and is now widespread," adds the head of Omniasig.
That is why, according to Toma, for some insurance companies there is no correlation between underwritten premiums and the reserves they set up, their strategy being to seize an optimum market share, and sell it at highest possible price. He says there is "no stopping" insurers' eagerness to make as much business as possible from comprehensive insurance and auto liability insurance - the market drivers, whilst there is no limit to the level of commissions that some pay to brokers.
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