Before the announcement of the 4Q/FY24 quarter results in March, a number of Chinese insurers had already announced expected profit growth for 2024, with YoY increment from 20-40% to 175-195%, mainly reflecting the strong performance of equity investments, Goldman Sachs said in a report. The broker assumed this was mostly priced in, and the announced profit growth was broadly in line with the broker's forecast.

Goldman Sachs updated its forecasts to reflect positive profit alerts and the latest changes in sales and investment markets. In particular, it took into account the plunge in long-term bond yields in December 2024 and the lower cost of new business liabilities under a more flexible repricing framework. As a result, the target prices of the covered H-share insurers were reduced by 2-11%. The latest ratings and target prices of the sector are listed in a separate table.

Related NewsJPM Initiates Coverage on 4 CN Small & Mid-cap Insurers w/ Top Pick CHINA RE (01508.HK)
Based on valuation factors, the broker downgraded NCI (01336.HK)  +1.000 (+2.356%)    Short selling $48.39M; Ratio 10.485%   from Neutral to Sell and downgraded PICC GROUP (01339.HK)  0.000 (0.000%)    Short selling $27.05M; Ratio 16.323%   from Buy to Neutral. It maintained its Buy rating on PING AN (02318.HK)  +1.150 (+2.302%)    Short selling $339.43M; Ratio 15.435%   and CHINA LIFE (02628.HK)  +0.440 (+2.282%)    Short selling $64.92M; Ratio 5.856%   .
(HK stocks quote is delayed for at least 15 mins.Short Selling Data as at 2025-06-25 12:25.)