![\"\"](\"https:\/\/insurancenewsnet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/limra-1q.jpg\")
<\/span><\/em><\/p>\nOverall UL sales (fixed UL and IUL) in the first quarter fell 3 percent compared to the year-ago period and the number of policies sold also fell, LIMRA said.<\/p>\n
UL sales measured by new premium dropped by $80 million in the first quarter over the year-ago period.<\/p>\n
Face amounts also fell 16 percent.<\/p>\n
Sales of lifetime guarantee UL fell 24 percent, LIMRA also reported.<\/p>\n
Lifetime guarantee UL products are more expensive for insurers to honor when interest rates are low because of the guarantees and higher reserving requirements.<\/p>\n
UL with lifetime guarantees represented 17 percent of UL sales and 6 percent of life premiums in the first quarter, LIMRA reported.<\/p>\n
UL represented 37 percent of all life insurance premium in the quarter.<\/p>\n
IUL Continues to Roll<\/h3>\n
IUL continued to shine with first quarter sales rising 8 percent compared to the year-ago period, LIMRA also reported.<\/p>\n
It is the sixth consecutive quarter for IUL growth, LIMRA also said.<\/p>\n
People like IUL policies because they offer market-linked performance, which means the potential for higher returns than a fixed product weighted down by low interest rates.<\/p>\n
Some insurers have recently entered the IUL market and insurers like IUL because lower reserving requirements make them less costly.<\/p>\n
In the first quarter, IUL represented 63 percent of UL premium and 23 percent of all individual life premium, LIMRA said.<\/p>\n
In addition, 44 percent of IUL writers and half of the top 10 IUL writers reported positive growth in the first quarter, LIMRA reported.<\/p>\n
Last October, Symetra and Ohio National entered the IUL market for the first time.<\/p>\n
Sales of variable universal life rose 10 percent in the first quarter compared with the year-ago period.<\/p>\n
It is the second consecutive quarter of double-digit VUL sales increases and seven out of the top 10 companies reported VUL growth, LIMRA said.<\/p>\n
VUL policy count also rose, by 8 percent over the year-ago quarter.<\/p>\n
VUL holds a 6 percent market share of total life sales in the first quarter.<\/p>\n
VUL sales are measured separately from UL and IUL.<\/p>\n
Whole Life Lags<\/h3>\n
Whole life sales fell 3 percent compared with the year-ago period and it is the third consecutive quarter of declines for whole life new premium, LIMRA said.<\/p>\n
“Whole life being down\u00a0is somewhat surprising,” Durham said. “We’re seeing dividends declining at some major writers and that could have an impact.”<\/p>\n
Some insurers blame low interest rates and recent changes to federal tax law for lagging whole life sales, LIMRA also said.<\/p>\n
Whole life\u00a0policy count fell 1 percent and face amounts fell 3 percent in the quarter, LIMRA reported.<\/p>\n
Whole life premium represents 36 percent of the total individual life insurance market.<\/p>\n
Term life sales were flat in the first quarter and term life commands an individual life insurance market share of 21 percent, LIMRA said.<\/p>\n
Summing up first quarter trends, “It’s kind of a continuation of the last quarter,” Durham said.<\/p>\n
InsuranceNewsNet Senior Writer Cyril Tuohy has covered the financial services industry for more than 15 years. Cyril may be reached at cyril.tuohy@innfeedback.com.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n \u00a9 Entire contents copyright 2018 by InsuranceNewsNet.com Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted without the expressed written consent from InsuranceNewsNet.com.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n The post UL Drags Down 1Q Life Insurance Sales<\/a> appeared first on InsuranceNewsNet<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Universal life sales fell 19 percent in the first quarter compared to the first quarter of last year. Not even white-hot indexed UL sales could lift the segment. <\/p>\n The post UL Drags Down 1Q Life Insurance Sales<\/a> appeared first on InsuranceNewsNet<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":578,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10399"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/578"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10399"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10400,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10399\/revisions\/10400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}