Aegon, a life insurance and pension company, has raised its 2010 value of new business target by 14% to E1.25 billion. The new target represents an average annual increase in the group's value of new business of approximately 18% over the period 2005 - 2010.
In recent quarters, Aegon’s businesses in the Americas, Europe and Asia have continued to make better-than-expected progress toward the Group’s original 2010 target of E1.1 billion.
Aegon expects the share of total value of new business (VNB) coming from Asia, Central and Eastern Europe and other European countries to reach 35% by 2010.
Don Shepard, chairman of the executive board, said: The underlying performance of our businesses in both our established and emerging markets continues to be strong, resulting in better-than-expected progress toward the value of new business target we announced last year.
As a result, we have increased the target to reflect the gains we are making across our businesses in the Americas, Europe and Asia. The strong increase in VNB, combined with a consistent improvement in the internal rate of return on new business and solid earnings growth provide a further indication of our commitment to growing our business profitably in both the near- and long-term.