Solid performance in Sampo Group’s P&C insurance operation

Sampo Group’s profit before taxes for 2008 amounted to EUR 870 million (3,833). The profit for the comparison year contains the sales gain of EUR 2,830 million from the Sampo Bank transaction. Earnings per share amounted to EUR 1.18 (6.18). The comparable earnings per share for 2007 were EUR 1.25. Earnings per share, including the change in the fair value reserve, amounted to EUR -3.52 per share (5.89).

Profit before taxes in P&C insurance increased to EUR 549 million (534) and the combined ratio remained sound at 91.8 per cent (90.6). Profit before taxes in life insurance decreased to EUR 140 million (342). Profit before taxes for the segment ‘Holding’ amounted to EUR 180 million (95).

- We can rely on a very well-run insurance operation which will be strongly cash flow generative in the future as it has been in the past. We have consistently been able to not just to achieve our targets of combined ratios, we have persistently over-achieved and I’m certain we will continue to do so in the future as well, Björn Wahlroos, Group CEO and President, says in his review.

Sampo’s net asset value per share in the end of December 2008 amounted to EUR 8.28 (13.49). Sampo Group has not made use of any of the relaxations in the IFRS rules in the valuation of assets. The fair value reserve on the Group level decreased to EUR –2,364 million (316). Furthermore net asset value was burdened by the exceptionally weak Swedish krona.

The Board proposes to the AGM on 7 April 2009 a dividend of EUR 0.80 per share and an authorization to repurchase at maximum 50 million Sampo A shares.

Sampo Group had on 31 December 2008 approximately EUR 2.1 billion of excess capital calculated as the difference between group equity and the economic capital required to manage the operations.

Inevitably the capital market conditions will leave their mark on Sampo Group’s investment assets and the returns achieved. Sampo Group’s result for 2009 will largely depend on the proceeds of the P&C insurance operation. Profitability is expected to remain on a good level, however, because of the steady performance of the P&C insurance operations and the high yields expected on our fixed income portfolios.

The insurance technical result of If P&C is not expected to suffer in 2009 from the economic downturn. If P&C is as usual expected to reach its long-term combined ratio target of below 95 per cent.


Please find Sampo Group’s complete Result Release for January - December 2008, Group CEO and President Björn Wahlroos’s review of year 2008 developments, and Supplementary Financial Information on the Internet at www.sampo.com/ir.

For more information, please contact:
Maria Silander, Press Officer, +358 10 516 0031

Sampo will arrange a Finnish language press conference on the 2008 results at The Palace, Eteläranta 10, Sea Cabinet 10. floor, Helsinki, today at 1.30 p.m. Finnish time.

An English-language telephone conference for investors and analysts will be held at 4 pm Finnish time (3 pm CET). Please call +44 (0) 20 7162 0025 (UK/European) or +1 334 323 6201 (North American). Password: SAMPO. The telephone conference can also be followed from a direct transmission on the Internet at www.sampo.com/ir. A recorded version will later be available at the same address.

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