{"id":874306,"date":"2026-09-08T08:33:31","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T06:33:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=874306"},"modified":"2026-09-08T08:33:33","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T06:33:33","slug":"war-comes-for-south-africas-oldest-insurer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/874306\/war-comes-for-south-africas-oldest-insurer\/","title":{"rendered":"War comes for South Africa’s oldest insurer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Old Mutual has seen its earnings fall in its latest interim period, as global tensions continue to curb investors’ risk appetite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The business was founded in 1845 in Cape Town, making it the oldest insurance company in the country and the second largest by market cap, closely trailing Sanlam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its interim results, the company saw its headline earnings decrease by approximately 5.5% year-on-year to R3.9 billion, from R4.2 billion in the same period in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its adjusted headline earnings tell a more worrying story, dropping by 30% to roughly R3 billion year-on-year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company said the decline in earnings was due to negative shareholder investment returns, driven by the poor performance of equity and bond indices in the period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Adjusted headline earnings decreased, primarily driven by negative shareholder investment returns compared to the prior period,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The performance of the shareholder portfolio followed the performance of the Equity and Bond Indices over the period.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Old Mutual said these weaker performances in global markets were caused by ongoing geopolitical tensions, particularly the war in the Middle East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The war in Iran has continued to limit the risk appetite of many investors, limiting the performance of equity and bond markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This should be seen against sharp risk-off conditions driven by ongoing geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East, which have negatively impacted equity and bond performance,” Old Mutual said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company said the large difference between headline and adjusted headline earnings was due to its strong results in Zimbabwe, which is not reflected in its adjusted headline earnings for the period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Old Mutual has seen continuous success in Zimbabwe, and recently relisted on the Victoria Falls Stock Exchange, the country’s main bourse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Headline earnings and IFRS profits benefited from a strong performance in Zimbabwe, which is not included in adjusted headline earnings,” the company said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A difficult period<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

While headline earnings fell, the company did see growth in its life and savings sector, with the embedded value of this segment rising by 4%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Life insurance sales rose by 21% year-on-year to roughly R7.9 billion, with the value of new business also rising notably from the prior period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The value of new business in the life and savings sector grew by 32% for Old Mutual to R569 million, up from R432 million in the same period in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company said this growth in new business came despite industry-wide challenges with annuity volumes in personal finance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This was achieved despite continued industry-wide pressure on guaranteed annuity volumes in Personal Finance,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Old Mutual’s banking segment declined, continuing to post losses for the company, down approximately 97% year-on-year in results from operations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite net interest income growing, non-interest income weighed on the sector, down roughly 5% to R579 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For investors, the weaker headline earnings have led to a roughly 1% decline in headline earnings per share (HEPS) and a 27% drop in adjusted HEPS year-on-year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Old Mutual’s dividends rose slightly for the interim period to 40 cents per share, up roughly 8% from 37 cents per share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We delivered a solid first-half performance, underpinned by focused execution and growth momentum across our businesses,” Old Mutual group CEO Jurie Strydom said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The strong sales growth, continued cost discipline and improved persistency experience supported an 11% growth in results from operations per share and an increase in return on group equity value to 12.7%.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Old Mutual interim financial results<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/td>Six months ended 30 June 2026<\/strong><\/td>Six months ended 30 June 2025<\/strong><\/td>Change %<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
Results from operations<\/strong><\/td>R5.3 billion<\/td>R4.9 billion<\/td>8.2%<\/td><\/tr>
HEPS (cents)<\/strong><\/td>96.9<\/td>97.5<\/td>\u20131%<\/td><\/tr>
Headline earnings<\/strong><\/td>R3.9 billion<\/td>R4.2 billion<\/td>\u20135.5%<\/td><\/tr>
Dividend (cents)<\/strong><\/td>40<\/td>37<\/td>8%<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Old Mutual’s headline earnings took a knock in its latest interim period, driven by negative shareholder investment returns.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":858256,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2097211848374288616","_sma_facebook_post_id":"191437357620492_2199253027561763","_sma_instagram_post_id":"18094349597103157","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[22496,1110,2880,5557],"class_list":["post-874306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-jurie-strydom","tag-old-mutual","tag-sanlam","tag-zimbabwe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=874306"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":874332,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874306\/revisions\/874332"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/858256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=874306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=874306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=874306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}