Tadiwa Musiyiwa
HARARE – Old Mutual Zimbabwe says its investment approaches continues to be skewed towards equities and property as the company continues to focus on defending value for its policyholders and customers.
In a trading update at the group’s AGM, on Thursday, chief executive Sam Matsekete said that the company continues to deploy capital in new projects and in initiatives aimed at making the business more effective and efficient in serving its customers and clients.
“(In the half year period), we continued to adapt our products, in view of the high inflation environment, to ensure that customers can exercise more choice amongst options within our offering and that they also have flexibility in managing the risk covers they
accessed from our insurance businesses.”
Financial risks were kept within appetite and regulatory requirements on capital and liquidity were met and in the majority of cases surpassed.
Matsekete said investments in alternative assets closed ahead of the targets we set. While some projects were derailed by Covid 19 induced lockdowns, a few were completed during the period. “We continued to deploy capital in new projects and in initiatives aimed at making the business more effective and efficient in serving its customers and clients.
Investments in infrastructure in green energy and in the real estate sector were sustained during the period.
Matsekete said cross the business units there was increased thrust to increase our participation in value chains that have demonstrated ability to be resilient under high inflation conditions. This includes the export sector and certain subsectors of FMCG and the service industry.
The group approved the remuneration of Directors amounting to ZWL7 947 377 and the external auditor’s remuneration amounting to ZWL20 448 667 for the year ended 31 December 2020.
The company will be changing auditors for the year ended 2021 from KPMG to Deloitte in line with changes happening at the company level as well as the need to rationalise auditor arrangements within the Zimbabwe group. The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has approved the appointment of Charity Mtwazi of Deloitte Chartered Accountants as the company’s auditor for the ensuing year as recommended by the board.
