Chairman of Guardian Holdings Limited (GHL) Arthur Lok Jack said the reduction in the company's year-to-date profits compared to the same period last year was due to "costly challenges" in investment activites this year and favoourable events last year.Third quarter results published this week show year-to-date after tax profits of $197.7 million, considerably less than the $301.8 million recorded in the same period last year.
Lok Jack explained: "Shareholders will recall that the prior two quarters were negatively affected by the Jamaican debt exchange in the first quarter and fair value movements in the second. These two items amounted to a loss of $73 million."On the other hand, last year GHL had positive realised gains and fair value movements totalling $17 million."
He described the third quater as the strongest for GHL in the current calendar year with after tax profits of $91.4 million contributing an additional 39 cents of basic earnings per share."The principal contributor to these excellent results was our insurance business that had a particularly strong quarter. Top line, or gross premiums written, amounted to $1.08 billion and grew 14 per cent quarter over quarter due to strong life sales and new acquisitions," the GHL chairman said.
GHL's core insurance operations realised profits that were up eight per cent year on year and gross premiums written year to date amounted to $3.86 billion.The group's assets increased by $492 million year to date and now stand ar $22.946 billion.