Great West Lifeco sees net earnings drop, base earnings rise in first quarter

Great-West Lifeco Inc. says net earnings for its first quarter were $595 million, down more than 55% from $1.3 billion a year earlier, while iA Financial Corp. says Q1 insurance and wealth management sales have dropped.

Great-West Lifeco

Winnipeg-based Great-West says base earnings for the quarter ended March 31 were $808 million, up more than 13% from $712 million the same quarter a year ago.

Diluted earnings per share were 64 cents, down from $1.43 a year earlier.

The company attributed the decline in net earnings in part to losses in non-fixed-income assets, and effects from changing interest rates.

It said the increase in base earnings was driven in part by recent acquisitions.

Great-West Lifeco acquired the retirement business of Prudential Financial Inc. in April 2022.

Insurance and annuities sales in Canada were down by 14.8% year over year at $156 million, primarily due to lower single premium group annuity sales and partially offset by higher participating life sales, while individual wealth sales were down 8.8%, at $2.66 billion, reflecting lower markets.

On April 3, Great-West subsidiary Canada Life announced an agreement to acquire Investment Planning Counsel Inc. from IGM Financial Inc. Both Great-West and IGM are majority-owned by Power Corp.

iA Financial

Meanwhile, Quebec City-based iA reported Q1 net income of $270 million, a quarterly record achieved from a solid insurance service result and a strong net investment result, Jacques Potvin, executive vice-president, chief financial officer and chief actuary with iA, said in a release. That compared to a restated net loss of $25 million a year earlier.

Both iA and Great-West restated their 2022 results because International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) 17 and 9 have replaced IFRS 4 and International Accounting Standards 39 respectively.

At iA, individual insurance sales totalling $89 million were down by 12% year over year, while wealth management gross sales of $2.23 billion were down by 8%. Assets under management and administration were about $207.8 billion at March 31, down by 1.2% from $210.4 billion a year earlier.

In other news, iA announced several executive changes on Wednesday, including the appointment of Denis Berthiaume as executive vice-president, strategy and performance and co-head of acquisitions. Until 2019, Berthiaume was executive vice president and chief operating officer of Desjardins Group. He was named 2016 Financial Personality of the Year by Finance et Investissement, a sister publication of Advisor.ca.

Staff, with files from The Canadian Press

The Canadian Press is a national news agency headquartered in Toronto and founded in 1917.