Allianz Sigorta’s rating of Moody’s global scale ratings was raised to Aaa.tr from Aa2.tr. Moody’s officials reported that this repositioning of Allianz’s rating was in parallel with the recalibration of the Turkish national rating scale. This rating is also the highest rating ever assigned to a financial institution in Turkey.
According to the review of Moody’s, development of Allianz Turkey’s independent credit profile is supported by its leadership position in Turkish insurance market, diversity of its product range in non-life, life and pension segments, and sustainability of very good levels of its operating profitability. With the strength of its group company Allianz SE, Allianz Turkey continues to show stable organic growth between its units. Moody’s also stated that they evaluated Allianz Turkey’s independent credit profile considering Turkey’s creditworthiness, since its directly exposed to Turkey’s country risk in terms of investment portfolio and business profile.
Aylin Somersan-Coqui, CEO of Allianz Turkey, gave statement regarding Allianz Turkey’s robust financial structure which has been confirmed by Moody’s as follows:
“We operate with a growth strategy in every field of activity. The basis of our strategy lies in sustainable growth and our customer-oriented approach, our balanced portfolio and ability to access different segments over our multiple sales channels and with our strong infrastructure. With the global strength and financial services expertise of Allianz Group, we are the leader of our market. Our market leadership, diversity of our product range, and excellence of our profitability level as a result of our pricing policy stand out as the indicators of our highest rating so far. The main reason we have focused on sustainable growth is to gain power to invest in the right areas and an opportunity to provide better services for the society as a whole. We emphasize that competition must not only focus on price but also and more importantly on product and service quality in order to achieve market growth. We will continue moving in this direction in the coming years.”
Positive performance despite national risk
Moody’s evaluates Allianz Turkey’s highest Aaa.tr rating under specific categories. First of all, Allianz Turkey gained the rating A under the category of market position and brand with its sustainable leadership in the growing Turkish market. This rating was further supported by its good progress in product range diversity despite being restricted by high operating risk, under the category of product focus and diversity. Under the category of profitability, Allianz Turkey’s highest rating was based on its preservation of sustainable profitability and robust pricing results despite the problems of Turkish market. Moody’s also stated in is review that Allianz Sigorta had a good diversity an control of its distribution channels, supported by exclusive bank agreements in recent years; though its non-life products are mainly sold by agents. Moody’s added that the company’s active asset quality, liquidity level and positive course of its asset-liability management have been restricted due to the high concentration of Turkish government bonds. Finally, the ratings agency said that Allianz Turkey’s capital adequacy was sufficient and compliant with the capital policy of Allianz Group; and that its reserve risk is considerably high among all companies in Turkish non-life insurance market.
