Swiss Life says set to meet or beat 2021 financial goals

ZURICH (Reuters) - Swiss Life fee income rose 15% in local currency to 1.64 billion Swiss francs ($1.80 billion) in the first nine months of the year as all divisions contributed to the rise, Switzerland's biggest life insurer said on Tuesday.

Premiums fell 2% in local currency to 15.2 billion francs, while it estimated its SST solvency ratio stood at around 210% as of the end of September, above the target range of 140 to 190%.

"We are convinced that we will achieve or exceed our financial targets under our 'Swiss Life 2021' Group-wide programme. This puts us in an excellent position to further develop Swiss Life successfully," Chief Executive Patrick Frost said in a statement.

Swiss Life will present its goals for the next strategic period on Nov. 25. Its 2021 goals also included returning 2-2.25 billion francs to the holding company over the 2019-2021 period.

In the first nine months, Swiss Life Asset Managers posted net new assets of 6.3 billion francs in its third-party asset management (TPAM) business, where assets under management rose to 100 billion at the end of September from 92 billion at the end of 2020.

Direct investment income was flat at 2.95 billion, while the non-annualised direct investment yield slipped to 1.7% from 1.8%. The net investment yield on a non-annualised basis increased to 2.0% from 1.4%, it said.

(Reporting by Michael Shields; editing by Brenna Hughes Neghaiwi)