00:00Can you tell us if there's any impact or exposure that you're seeing from your business?
00:07Yeah, thank you, Heidi. Always great to be here.
00:10Our business is a very long-term business, and it plays to the real needs of people.
00:15So we see fluctuations in markets. We see sentiment shift from positive to negative.
00:22What we continue to see through the cycles is a strong demand for our products and services
00:27because they meet the real needs of people.
00:30Our protection and long-term savings products really go to the heart of what people need for their retirement
00:35to protect them for their health care and so on.
00:38So we still see continued demand.
00:41You see that demand coming through in the very strongly excellent results we've posted today.
00:46We see good momentum in the business, and we're very confident about the future.
00:53There's also, of course, private credit as an area to worry about as well.
00:56Does the business have any exposure there?
01:00We have a very small exposure. It's about 2% of our assets are invested in private credit.
01:05The investment is with the big private credit investor companies.
01:12What we see is that the majority of that investment is in senior structured direct lending.
01:18We think it's a very attractive asset class, if managed very properly.
01:23Obviously, we have a very disciplined investment function.
01:26We're very focused on credit risk in particular and look through all our exposures.
01:30We're very comfortable with our exposure.
01:32And as I say, 2% of the overall portfolio of assets.
01:37When you have another war raging in Iran and you have more uncertainty about where global rates are headed,
01:43and there seems to be sort of a narrative that those rate cuts might get delayed,
01:49what is the impact when it comes to the uptake of your products and demand out there?
01:55Because a lot of these products could also potentially compete with other financial goods out there with high bond yields
02:03now being a norm.
02:06Yeah, our products are long term.
02:08And with that, they move through cycles.
02:12What we have is products that meet the long term savings needs through a variety of investments.
02:18Our stewardship of those assets is very careful.
02:21People can be confident that we'll provide good returns to our customers and be there when we need to be
02:27there.
02:28What we see is that demand comes through into the sales volumes.
02:32You saw good growth in volumes.
02:33We see that the business is in great shape.
02:36We see that the alternatives that are available are still there.
02:41But that demand for our products continues through the cycles.
02:45And that's really the message that I wanted to get across this morning is that ours is a long term
02:50business.
02:50We see fluctuations from time to time.
02:53Clearly on the balance sheet side, we have a very disciplined asset liability management.
02:57And we update our products regularly to meet the varying needs of customers as they evolve,
03:03particularly for the long term pensions products.
03:05So with that, we continue to see the demand coming.
03:09We see the momentum in the in the business.
03:12And we can see that the track record that we have over many years is continuing.
03:17And that track record has been built through cycles.
03:20We've seen interest rates shift.
03:21We've seen curve shift.
03:22But that demand continues throughout.
03:26Many Asian economies, of course, are energy importers.
03:29Do you see any of that macro stress coming from the Iran crisis leading to some downside pressure?
03:36And what are your expectations for that positive momentum that you talked about to actually continue into the uncertainties of
03:42this year?
03:45Yeah, from a balance sheet perspective, we have a very strong asset liability management, as I said.
03:52We have a very strong balance sheet.
03:54So from that perspective, we're very secure.
03:56From a demand perspective and a growth perspective, we see that the technology that we've used, that we've implemented, has
04:03increased the productivity of the agency force, which is 73 percent of our sales are through the agency force.
04:09You saw that growth 13 percent last year.
04:13You see that the partnership business through banks and brokers grew by 22 percent.
04:18What we have is a situation where the fundamental structural drivers of our growth in Asia are still intact.
04:27The consumer, the affluent consumer, still has funds.
04:31And we see our products as a long term savings products as a good place to stewardship those funds for
04:37good returns to customers.
04:38People also have protection needs on a continuing basis, regardless of the macroeconomic environment.
04:44So, again, good demand.
04:46And on the supply side, we see good supply.
04:48Our agent recruitment is very strong.
04:51And with that, we can see that the sales momentum is very good.
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