Liberty: A giant playing catch-up
While competitors Sanlam and Discovery pursue new avenues, the once-dominant Liberty seems to be left with Africa and, rather late in the day, SA short-term insurance
Liberty will have a tough time catching up with, let alone overtaking, some smart competitors. In most surveys SA is rated as the world’s most innovative life insurance market. It is ironic that Discovery, in some ways, produced even worse results than Liberty. Its total comprehensive income for the six months ending December fell by 92%. Its new business in the UK was down 11%. Yet investors did not turn a hair. This must have been grating to Liberty, given how many Liberty-trained people run Discovery — from CEO Adrian Gore and his deputy Barry Swartzberg to key executives such as Herschel Mayers, who runs the UK business after starting the life business, and Kenny Rabson, who runs Discovery Invest. Coronation analyst Nic Stein says Discovery was able to work off a blank sheet of paper and set up new systems for its life business, which was launched only in 2000. Investors can see a clear growth path for Discovery as its short-term insurer comes into profit and not long after that...
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