Allianz Expands Buyback After Profit Beats Market Expectations

By Elena Vardon

Allianz increased the size of its share buyback program for the year and reported a better-than-expected profit for the second quarter.

Europe's largest insurer on Thursday reported a net profit of 2.51 billion euros ($2.74 billion) for the three months ended June 30 compared with EUR2.34 billion for the same period last year, beating an estimate of EUR2.32 billion taken from a company-compiled consensus.

Total business volume, or revenue, rose 7.6% to EUR42.6 billion, it said.

The German group's operating profit grew 3.8% on year to EUR3.93 billion, while consensus had penciled in EUR3.70 billion.

Allianz reiterated its guidance for the year, confirming that it expects operating profit of EUR14.8 billion, plus or minus EUR1 billion. "We look with confidence to the second half of 2024," Chief Financial Officer Claire-Marie Coste-Lepoutre said.

The Munich-based group's asset-management business--which houses Pimco and Allianz Global Investors--had EUR1.803 trillion in third-party assets under management on June 30, driven by EUR14.1 billion in net inflows during the second quarter, it said.

Allianz expanded its share buyback program for 2024 to EUR1.5 billion. In addition to the EUR1 billion program completed in July, the group will launch another up to EUR500 million buyback mid-August to be finalized by the end of December.

Write to Elena Vardon at elena.vardon@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 08, 2024 01:46 ET (05:46 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2024 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.