NIB shares fall despite lift in profit
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More news: Shares in NIB Holdings fell 3.7% to $7.88 at 12:45pm AEDT, despite the health insurer maintaining its full-year growth guidance and posting a solid lift in first-half profit.
What they said: UBS analysts said that NIB's earnings and dividend beat expectations but noted that there were "some issues here for market to work through to assess the quality of headline earnings".
While NIB's underlying operating profit of $144 million came in 13% ahead of consensus, UBS said the near-term guidance of "stable underlying margins in FY24" remains a little unclear.
NIB keeps guidance after half-year profit lift
The news: Health insurer NIB Holdings has maintained its full-year growth guidance after posting a solid lift in first-half profit.
The numbers: Net profit for the six months to December 2023 rose 19% to $106.4 million. Revenue was up 13% to $1.71 billion. The company will pay an interim dividend of 15 cents a share, up from 13 cents a year ago.
It expects to meet its guidance for full-year policyholder growth of 3% to 4% and net margin of 6%-7%.
The context: NIB said its domestic customer sign-ups rose at 3.7% over the last 12 months, above industry growth levels, while growth in the non-resident segment was also strong.
Its NDIS business Thrive now has 39,000 customers after its recent acquisition of six plan management businesses, contributing $6.4 million to first half earnings. Chief executive Mark Fitzgibbon said a few Covid-19 related factors continued to have some influence on profitability, but the underlying business is in great shape.
“The membership and revenue growth across all of our private health insurance businesses are testimony to the competitiveness of nib’s products and pricing, especially at a time of growing cost-of-living pressures,’’ he said.
The source: ASX announcement
