SBI Life least affected by new surrender norms

Following SBI Life Insurance's Q2 earnings, managing director (MD) and chief executive officer (CEO) AMIT JHINGRAN spoke with Subrata Panda and Aathira Varier in Mumbai on the insurers' road ahead. Jhingran also talked about how the company is positioned to leverage various opportunities emerging in the sector. Edited excerpts:

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How do you see SBI Life's Q2 performance?

We are satisfied with our growth. As a strategy, we have decided to focus more on agency so that there is a balance in the channel mix. Currently, our banca channel (bancassurance) contributes 60-65 per cent to our top line. We launched agency 2.0, and the growth in the agency channel has been above our budgeted targets. Our banca channel growth has been somewhat muted. Additionally, we are consciously trying to tap the digital channel available on the banca side. And, we are also tapping State Bank of India's (SBI's) YONO platform. We have launched 7-8 products on the YONO platform. We hope that this will provide us with a good fillip in the second half.

How do you see your margins, going forward, especially with the surrender value norms coming into play?