2026 Mid-year Assessment of 58 Unlisted Life Insurers: Investment Drives Profit to Double, Hidden Surrender and Personnel Risks
In the first half of 2026, 58 unlisted life insurance companies delivered a highly contrasting performance report: their total net profit reached 61.686 billion yuan, a year-on-year surge of 108.6%; 51 companies turned profitable, accounting for nearly 90% of the total, and 13 companies realized a turnaround from losses to profits year on year. Coupled with the nearly 10% growth rate on the premium side and the explosive growth of participating insurance premiums that nearly doubled, the voice of "comprehensive recovery of the life insurance industry" has gradually emerged in the market.
However, looking beyond the surface of profits, another set of data outlines a completely different picture: the top 14 companies take more than 80% of the total industry profits, while small and medium-sized companies are still struggling on the edge of profit and loss; the comprehensive surrender rate of individual products is as high as 2189%, with hidden capital outflows; nearly 80% of the companies have witnessed personnel changes in their directors, supervisors and senior management, with intensified management turmoil; some insurance companies even had their solvency ratios fall below the regulatory red line, highlighting prominent capital pressure.
Is this industry carnival of doubled profits the substantive achievement of value transformation, or just book prosperity driven jointly by the capital market and accounting standards? Through a comprehensive review of the Q2 solvency reports of 58 unlisted life insurance companies, we try to restore the true business landscape of the industry.
I. 61.6 Billion Yuan of Doubled Profits: A Tiered Carnival Dominated by Leading Players
In terms of aggregate data, the growth of the unlisted life insurance industry in the first half of 2026 seems to be fully positive.
The total insurance business revenue of the 58 companies amounted to about 796.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of about 10% (the statistical caliber excludes China Life Pension). The original insurance premium income of participating life insurance across all life insurance companies reached about 1.01 trillion yuan, a year-on-year surge of 94.4%, becoming the absolute main driver of premium growth. The doubled growth of net profit has even become the core argument for the industry's "recovery theory".
However, the distribution structure of profits reveals the truth of the industry far better than aggregate data. The profit of the whole industry presents an extreme "pyramid" pattern: the top 14 companies with net profit exceeding 1 billion yuan contribute a total profit of 48.557 billion yuan, accounting for 80.34% of the total industry profit; the middle 28 companies with net profit between 100 million yuan and 1 billion yuan generate a total profit of 12.352 billion yuan, accounting for 20.44%; 8 companies with net profit less than 100 million yuan only make a total profit of 366 million yuan; the remaining 7 loss-making companies record a total loss of 831 million yuan.
Less than a quarter of leading companies have grabbed more than 80% of the industry's total profits, while more than 70% of small and medium-sized companies can only share less than 20% of the profit cake, and the Matthew effect in the life insurance industry has been pushed to the extreme.
Among the leading echelon, Taikang Life leads the pack by a large margin with a net profit of 15.821 billion yuan, but it posted a slight year-on-year decrease of 1.1%, which is particularly special against the backdrop of the industry's overall doubled profit. China Post Life and ICBC-AXA follow closely behind with 7.068 billion yuan and 4.317 billion yuan respectively.
Bank-backed insurance companies became the biggest winners in the first half of the year. The six bank-backed insurers, namely China Post Life, ICBC-AXA, ABC Life, CCB Life, Cigna & CMB Life and BOCOM Life, recorded a total net profit of nearly 21 billion yuan, accounting for about 43% of the total profits of the 14 leading companies. Relying on the channel advantages of their parent banks, bank-backed insurers have taken full advantage of the boom of participating insurance, but it remains to be seen whether this growth model that relies on "transfusion-style" sales from parent banks can be transformed into sustainable endogenous value creation capabilities.
What is more worthy of vigilance is the mismatch between premium scale and profitability. Lian Life recorded a premium income of 19.585 billion yuan in the first half of the year, ranking in the middle of the industry in terms of scale, but its net profit was only 390 million yuan, with a profit margin of less than 2%, which is a typical "large but not strong" enterprise. In contrast, Peking University Founder Life only has a premium scale of 2.691 billion yuan, but its net profit reached 688 million yuan, with a profit margin of over 25%, embarking on a "small but beautiful" development path. The fact that scale expansion has not been translated into profits simultaneously reflects that some companies still rely on low-value scale-oriented products to boost premiums, and the value transformation has not yet been truly implemented.
II. Investment Dependence and Hidden Surrender Risks: Structural Cracks Under the Prosperity
Behind the doubled profits, two major driving forces cannot be ignored: first, the strong performance of the capital market in the first half of the year, and second, the implementation of new accounting standards has amplified profit elasticity. These two factors also constitute the root of the fragility of this round of profit growth.
In the first half of 2026, the A-share market witnessed a structural bull market, with the Science and Technology Innovation 50 Index rising by more than 64% in half a year, and the ChiNext Index rising by 35.58%. Insurers that made early layouts in sectors such as semiconductors and AI saw their investment returns significantly increased, which became the primary driver of profit growth. Data shows that the median comprehensive investment return rate of the 58 companies was 2.46%, and the median investment return rate was 1.94%.
At the same time, 2026 is the first year for unlisted insurers to fully implement the new accounting standards IFRS 17 and IFRS 9 (some listed insurers have taken the lead in implementation as early as 2023). The discount rate on the liability side has been changed from the 750-day moving average to the spot rate on the balance sheet date, and the changes in the fair value of equity assets are directly included in the current profits, which is equivalent to installing an "amplifier" for the profits of insurers: profits will grow faster when the market rises, and losses will also be amplified synchronously when the market falls. Long Ge, a scholar from the School of Insurance, University of International Business and Economics, pointed out that under the new standards, the sensitivity of insurers' profits to interest rates and the capital market has increased significantly, and performance volatility will become the norm.
The risks of this "weather-dependent" profit model have already emerged. Xiaokang Life has become the most typical example of "drastic change" in the first half of the year: it turned from a profitable state in 2025 to a net loss of 508 million yuan in the first half of the year, with a net profit decline rate as high as 418.82%, ranking first in the loss list. Its comprehensive investment return rate plummeted from 11.64% last year to -5.24%, and the volatility on the investment side directly determined the company's profit and loss. A question worthy of further exploration is: if the capital market sees a correction in the second half of the year, how many more "Xiaokang Life" will surface?
In fact, the differentiation of the industry's investment capabilities has long been predetermined. The median investment return rate of the 58 companies is only 1.94%, far lower than the level of leading companies, indicating that the investment return growth of most companies mainly relies on the market beta, rather than their own active management capabilities. Once the market trend reverses, the industry's profits may recede rapidly.
Risks that are more hidden than profit volatility lie in the surrender data. According to statistics, the total surrender scale of the top three products in terms of surrender amount of 57 companies reached 22.19 billion yuan, and the capital outflow of these three products alone has exceeded 20 billion yuan. Taikang Life, China Post Life and CITIC Prudential rank the top three in terms of company surrender amount, reaching 4.134 billion yuan, 3.153 billion yuan and 3.067 billion yuan respectively; among individual products, the surrender payment of CITIC Prudential "Wisdom Life" Annuity Insurance Plan C reached 2.437 billion yuan, ranking first.
What is even more shocking is the abnormal surrender rate of individual products. Among the 168 products counted, the median comprehensive surrender rate is 7.20%, but 14 products have a surrender rate exceeding 50%, and 5 products exceeding 100%. The two middle-aged and elderly cancer insurance products of Dehua AnGu also have surrender rates of 216.70% and 174.91% respectively. Although extremely high surrender rates usually correspond to a very small business base, such products are concentrated in the fields of endowment insurance and middle-aged and elderly cancer insurance, and it is worthy of vigilance from regulators and consumers whether there are problems such as misleading sales and unreasonable product design behind this.
The pressure on the solvency side is also emerging synchronously. Two companies in the whole industry have unqualified solvency, 20 companies have seen a decline in net assets, and the overall solvency of the industry has decreased month on month. Among them, Changsheng Life has stepped on the regulatory red line: as of the end of the first quarter, its core solvency adequacy ratio was only 45.4%, and the comprehensive solvency adequacy ratio was 55.5%, both lower than the regulatory requirements, with negative net assets of about -413 million yuan. The company predicts that the two indicators may further deteriorate to 21.6% and 34.5% by the end of the second quarter, and it is now listing for capital increase and share expansion. If the capital supplement fails to meet expectations, it will face regulatory measures restricting its business scope.
III. Personnel Reshuffling and Capital Pressure: Industry Pains in the Deep Zone of Transformation
Behind the performance volatility are the deep-seated governance turmoil and capital changes of the industry.
Q2 data shows that among the 58 unlisted life insurance companies, 46 have witnessed changes in important positions of directors, supervisors and senior management, accounting for nearly 80% of the total; a total of 142 change records have been generated, involving 128 people, including 73 departures and 66 new appointments. The intensive turnover of management has become another notable feature of the industry in the first half of the year.
Among them, Guolian Life has 14 people and 16 change records, making it the company with the most frequent personnel changes. Companies such as Dehua AnGu, Tongfang Global Life and Happiness Life also have more than 7 personnel changes. Especially for Happiness Life, its management has continued to reshuffle in recent years, and the swing of strategic direction is intertwined with personnel turmoil. What is more noteworthy is the change in governance structure: CITIC Prudential, Minsheng Life and Haibao Life have canceled the setting of the board of supervisors, and the relevant supervision responsibilities are transferred to the audit committee of the board of directors. It remains controversial whether this adjustment of governance model is an optimization to improve efficiency or a weakening of supervision functions.
Behind the personnel turmoil is the strategic confusion of the industry during the transformation period. For most small and medium-sized insurers, against the backdrop of stricter regulation of "Unified Reporting and Implementation" and accelerated channel reform, the past model of relying on bank insurance channels to expand scale and relying on investment returns to supplement profits is unsustainable, but a new path of value growth has not yet been explored. "Changing executives" has often become the first choice for shareholders to try to break the deadlock, but frequent management turnover may instead interrupt the strategic continuity and fall into a cycle of "the more you change, the more chaotic it gets".
On the capital side, the industry presents the characteristics of "focusing on bond issuance, slowing down capital increase". In the first half of the year, a total of 11 unlisted life insurance companies supplemented capital through bond issuance and capital increase, with a total capital replenishment of 18.4 billion yuan. Among them, 7 companies issued capital bonds with a total amount of 13.5 billion yuan, and CITIC Prudential's 4 billion yuan of non-fixed-term capital bonds has the largest scale; 4 companies completed capital increase, with a total of 4.901 billion yuan, and Guobao Life has the highest capital increase of 3.075 billion yuan. 2026 is the first full year after the end of the transition period of the second phase of "C-ROSS", and insurers generally build capital safety cushions by issuing bonds, but the willingness of shareholders to increase capital has cooled significantly, and the capital replenishment channels for small and medium-sized companies are getting narrower and narrower.
The investment side shows an obvious differentiation pattern. In the first half of the year, 5 companies disclosed major investments with a total amount of 1.791 billion yuan, of which Taikang Life alone accounted for 42 deals, with a total amount of 1.396 billion yuan, accounting for 77.97% of the total industry investment, and almost all of the funds were invested in elderly care communities and medical management fields. In the downward cycle of the real estate industry, Taikang has bucked the trend to increase its investment in heavy-asset elderly care real estate, which is not only a long-term bet on the "insurance + elderly care" model, but also faces the test of long investment return cycle and heavy capital precipitation pressure.
Looking at this half-year report, the true operating level of the industry is already clear: profits have doubled but the quality is insufficient, and the growth mainly relies on the capital market performance and the dividends of accounting standards, rather than the substantive improvement of operating capabilities; the Matthew effect continues to intensify, leading companies remain strong, and the living space of small and medium-sized insurers continues to narrow; hidden surrender risks are emerging, and the abnormal high surrender rate of individual products exposes hidden dangers in product and sales ends; the intensive turnover of management reflects the strategic confusion and governance pains of the industry during the transformation period; the differentiation of solvency pressure emerges, and capital replenishment has become a life-and-death exam for some companies.
In 2026, the life insurance industry is in the deep zone of transformation from "scale expansion" to "value operation". The new accounting standards have amplified performance volatility, and the "Unified Reporting and Implementation" regulation has compressed the space for extensive growth. Small and medium-sized companies are facing triple squeezes from channels, brands and capital. After the book carnival of 600 billion yuan of profits, the real test of the industry has just begun — only companies that can survive the cycle fluctuations and truly build endogenous value growth capabilities can gain a firm foothold in the new round of reshuffling.
This article is from the WeChat official account "WEMONEY Research Office" (ID: wemoney1), Author: Wen Xin, published with authorization from 36Kr.