The German insurance giant Allianz reported on Thursday that it concluded the previous year with a loss primarily resulting from enormous costs associated with the sale of its banking subsidiary Dresdner Bank.
The net loss last year reached 2.44 billion euros, compared to a net profit of 7.97 billion euros in 2007, Allianz stated further in its announcement. The statement adds that the insurance group recorded a cost of 6.4 billion euros last year related to the sale of Dresdner Bank to Germany’s second-largest bank, Commerzbank. The sale was completed on January 12, more than a year and a half earlier than originally planned, Allianz reported. At the operational level, Allianz achieved a profit of 7.43 billion euros, which is 25 percent lower than in 2007 and slightly below analysts’ estimates of 7.5 billion euros.
Combined revenues last year decreased by 5.3 percent to 92.5 billion euros, while net income from continuing operations, excluding Dresdner, fell to 4.0 billion euros, compared to 7.3 billion in 2007. “Difficult conditions in the capital markets will continue throughout 2009. We are in the midst of the most severe economic crisis in the past few decades,” said the company’s chief Michael Diekman. “Reliable profit estimates for 2009 cannot be provided in the current environment.”
