Abstract

The objective of this paper is to compare the financial performance of public and private life and non-life insurance companies with the help of solvency ratio. The major life insurance companies are Life Insurance Corporation of India, Bajaj Allianz Life Insurance Company, HDFC Standard Life Insurance Company, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company and Birla Sunlife Insurance Company Limited. The major non-life insurance companies are National Insurance Company Limited, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Limited, Royal Sundaram Alliance Insurance Company Limited, Reliance General Insurance Company Limited and Tata AIG Insurance Company Limited In practice, the insurance sector is a colossal one and is growing at a speedy rate of 15-20% together with banking services, insurance services contribute as about 7% to the country’s GDP. Although, in Life Insurance Companies, Bajaj Allianz secured first position by maintaining a high solvency ratio over 7 years and LIC stood last.  ICICI Lombard secured first position in solvency ratio among all the non-life insurance companies followed by Tata AIG and Reliance. National General stood fourth and Royal Sundaram stood last. The study also revealed that in case of life insurers the difference in the solvency ratio between public and private sector was significant while in case of non-life insurers the difference was insignificant.

Key Words: Companies, Life Insurance, Non-Life Insurance, Performance, Solvency, Public Sector, Private Sector.