Metlife Boosts Stake In Indian JV After Investment Limit Relaxed

U.S. insurer MetLife Inc said on Monday it would increase the stake in its Indian joint venture, availing of the increased limit for foreign companies' investment into the country's insurance industry announced earlier this year.

MetLife said it had entered into an agreement with IGE India and Elpro International to acquire their combined stake of 15.27% in PNB MetLife India Insurance Company Limited.

The deal will boost MetLife's stake in PNB MetLife to more than 47%.

Foreign institutional investors are now allowed to hold up to 74% of private insurance companies in India compared with the earlier limit of 49%.

The relaxed limit, which was announced by Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her budget speech for 2021-22, is expected to attract inflows from U.S. and European insurers.

PNB MetLife is a leading life insurance franchise in India with more than 200 million customers across 15,000 sales locations.

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain in Bengaluru; Editing by Vinay Dwivedi)

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance.

We, however, have a request.

As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed.

Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard.

Digital Editor