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CompanyConfirmedUAE
Orient Insurance lifts half-year profit to AED 545m as revenue jumps 17%
Al-Futtaim's Orient Insurance reported net profit of AED 545m for the first half, 8% ahead of last year, on insurance revenue of AED 5.22bn, up 17%. Profit growing at half the rate of revenue is the tell: the new business is coming in at thinner margins, which is the pattern across the larger UAE books this cycle.
CompanyCorroboratedSaudi Arabia
Bupa Arabia adds 7% to second-quarter profit
Saudi Arabia's largest health insurer posted net profit of SAR 306.7m for the second quarter, up 7.2% year on year, taking the half-year figure to SAR 694.0m against SAR 666.4m. Steady rather than spectacular, and a useful benchmark given the claims pressure showing up at other Saudi carriers this reporting season.
CompanyCorroboratedSaudi Arabia
SAICO's second-quarter profit falls 79% to SAR 2.8m
Saudi Arabian Cooperative Insurance reported net profit after zakat attributable to shareholders of SAR 2.8m for the second quarter, down 78.6% on the same quarter last year. A drop of that size at a mid-sized carrier is a reminder that the Saudi market's headline premium growth is not reaching everyone, and that scale is doing most of the work on margin.
AI in insuranceCorroboratedSaudi Arabia
Saudi insurtech DESAISIV launches an AI pricing benchmark for corporate health cover
Riyadh-based DESAISIV has released what it calls a Fair Market Pricing Engine, using AI and analytics to benchmark corporate health insurance pricing, assess policy performance and identify cost savings for buyers. The firm says it manages portfolios worth around SAR 2bn for more than 600 organisations, which puts genuine pricing transparency on the buy side of a market where that information has traditionally sat with brokers and carriers.
People movesSingle-sourceGCC
Liberty Specialty Markets builds a MENA risk engineering bench for energy and construction
Liberty Specialty Markets has appointed Richard Mundy as principal risk engineer for energy, with Sam McLachlan on construction and Taz Chowdhury on power, all newly created roles serving the Middle East and North Africa. In-region engineering capability is increasingly what decides who gets a seat on the large project placements.
People movesSingle-sourceGCC
MNK International hands William Wakeham a new international energy division
MNK International has appointed William Wakeham as managing director of a newly formed international energy division covering Africa, the Middle East and selected other territories, spanning conventional energy, renewables, battery storage, data centres and grid infrastructure. Brokers are visibly staffing up around the region's energy and infrastructure build-out.