LIC sees West Asia war hitting insurance growth amid lower savings
Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), India’s largest insurer, expects growth to slow due to the West Asian war but hopes to maintain its target of “double-digit growth” for new business premiums, managing director and CEO R. Doraiswamy said on Thursday.
“Every sector is expected to be affected by the crisis. Naturally, when people experience some difficulties, savings through savings and life insurance may also have an impact, but we will do our best to see that we continue to progress towards our targeted growth rate,” he said in the company’s fourth quarter and 2025-26 earnings call.
Renewal premium growth is more likely to be affected, he added.
LIC declared consolidated net profit ₹23,467 crore in the March quarter, up 23% year-on-year. Consolidated profit after tax reached a record with a 19.3% increase in the 26th Fiscal Year ₹57,419 crore.
Total premium income increased by 9.8% annually ₹5.4 trillion in FY26, led by 8.3% increase in new business premium. ₹67,676 crore and 5.9% increase in renewal premium. ₹2.7 trillion.
“The existing business alone can contribute to the renewal business. So, wherever we sell a large number of policies in non-single mode, we have the possibility of increasing it. So, we are making all efforts to see our renewal also grow by a reasonable margin,” he said, adding that the insurer is working to improve renewal premium collections.
Insurer declared bonus to policyholder ₹59,726 crore for the year.
Market share is shrinking
As of the end of March 2026, LIC’s market share decreased by 0.4% to 56.7% on a premium basis, and its 0.7% market share on the number of policies decreased to 65.2%.
Doraiswamy said how the market share will be divided depends on how the industry grows in terms of new players. “Any market that expands and allows new players to enter will see each new player take market share,” he said, adding that he wanted to focus on how LIC grows. “We want the pie to grow. We want everyone to grow and the industry to thrive.”
While the removal of goods and services tax (GST) on retail period and healthcare policies helped boost policy sales in the second half of the financial year, the impact of surrender value norms implemented in October 2024 continues to weigh on the overall growth, Doraiswamy said, adding that the growth picked up in FY27 and showed a good trend in April 2026.
“We have shown good growth in the number of policies and premium income and the group business has also performed well. So we are expecting good growth as of now,” he said.
He reiterated that he believes the insurance company’s shares are undervalued and that the strong performance is not reflected in the share price. “The company and the shares as a whole have tremendous value, and we’ve always felt that that should increase,” he said.
Hoping the market will begin to take notice of the insurer’s performance, he said shares should rise “in the coming days” but remained uncertain about the trajectory given the current “challenging” economic and market conditions.
LIC shares ended the day up 0.4%. ₹804th on the National Stock Exchange. It announced its results after market.
