Manulife’s Wealth Business May Feel Mkt Pain - CEO
TORONTO (Reuters) - Insurance company Manulife Financial
Corp (MFC.TO: Quote, Profile, Research) is in the best shape it has been in years, but
management still worries about how financial market turmoil
will affect the wealth-management side of the company, its top
executive said on Thursday.
“We’re operating in a backdrop of very unsettled markets,
our wealth businesses are going to be affected,” Dominic
D’Alessandro, president and chief executive of Canada’s largest
insurer, said on a conference call.
If customers are worried about their jobs, they may buy
fewer investment products, and when the market value of assets
declines, it hurts fee income, D’Alessandro noted.
But Manulife has a strong balance sheet and a conservative
investment portfolio — “we don’t mess around with exotic
instruments,” D’Alessandro said — and it remains interested in
potential acquisitions.
“We’re very interested, we have the capital … so we keep
our eyes and ears close to the ground,” D’Alessandro said of
potential deals.
With its business growth momentum and credit quality,
Manulife is well placed to weather difficult markets and to
capitalize on consolidation opportunities, BMO Capital Markets
analyst John Reucassel said in a research note.
Earlier in the day, Manulife said that net income climbed 4
percent on higher fee income and healthy investment
performance, although the strong Canadian dollar took a bite
out of its profit, Canada’s largest life insurer said.
Net income was C$1.14 billion ($1.14 billion), or 75
Canadian cents a share, in the three months ended Dec. 31. That
compares with earnings of C$1.10 billion, or 70 Canadian cents
a share, a year earlier.
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