Industrial Alliance Financial Group (IA) announced net income of $288 million in the third quarter of 2024, up 414% from $56 million in the same quarter of 2023.
As of September 30, IA’s annual profit was $736 million, up 38% from $533 million at the same time last year.
This increase was due in part to IA’s service contract margin – the value of unrealized gains – which increased by $100 million due to new underwriting business and $104 million due to positive macroeconomic impacts.
As of Sept. 30, the insurer had $249.7 billion in assets under management, up from $205 billion at the same time last year. This was supported by strong Canadian individual insurance sales and an inflow of segregated funds, which resulted in net premiums, premium equivalents and deposits of $4.9 billion, an increase of 25% compared to the same quarter of 2023.
Net income in the Canadian insurance segment for the quarter was $95 million, compared to $79 million in the same period last year. The increase was mainly due to price increases, lower impact of employee plans and lower expenses.
IA said it continued to rank first in Canada for gross ($1.3 billion) and net ($781 million) fund sales during the quarter. The 51% year-over-year increase in gross sales is driven by favorable market performance and customer selection of riskier asset classes.
Meanwhile, sales of insured annuities and other savings products fell from $618 million in last year’s third quarter to $483 million this year. Despite higher sales, mutual funds also experienced net outflows of $163 million.
IA completed two acquisitions this quarter: Laurentian Bank Securities added more than $2 billion in AUM across 15,000 client accounts and 25 IA Private Wealth Advisors; and two Prosperity Life Group business blocks added more than 115,000 policies with annual premiums of $100 million for IA’s U.S. business.
The insurer increased its dividend by 17% to $2.93.
