Danish pension provider PFA made a profit of DKK 1,336m, before tax, in the first half of 2024, its interim results reveal.

This is a substantial increase on the DKK 347m achieved in the same period in 2023. The provider attributed the increase to better investment results, as well as improved underlying operations in the insurance area and a large influx of customers in recent years.

Commenting, PFA CEO, Ole Krogh Petersen, said: "The first six months of the year have been good financially for our customers and thus also for PFA. Our customers have received one of the best returns among all pension companies over the past three years, and we are satisfied with that because it gives our customers financial security.

“I also note that the customer community continues to grow significantly and we are again setting records when it comes to deposits and net inflow of customers. We are pleased that our existing customers want to stay with PFA and that we can attract many new customers.”

"We also see great progress in the health and accident area, which is heading towards balance. This all adds up to a significantly improved bottom line, and since PFA is a customer community, our great progress benefits customers both financially and through our efforts to reduce long-term sickness absence. Overall, we are therefore very satisfied with the first six months of the year.”

PFA's profits benefit customers in the form of profit sharing via PFA KundeKapital. In the spring, PFA paid out DKK 1.7bn to customers in return on individual KundeKapital for 2023. Furthermore, with PFA's new model for KundeKapital, which came into effect on 1 January 2024, customers can expect even higher returns from KundeKapital for 2024, as the return is expected to increase from 8 to 10 per cent.

In the first six months of the year, PFA saw significant growth in customer payments compared to the same period in 2023. Total payments amounted to DKK 29.6bn compared to DKK 26.3bn in the same period last year. This is a growth of 12.4 per cent, and it is the highest payment PFA has ever had in a six-month period.

This growth is due to an 8.5 per cent increase in regular payments from DKK 14.9bn in the first half of 2023 to DKK 16.1bn in the first half of 2024. In addition, one-off payments increased by 17.4 per cent from DKK 11.5bn to DKK 13.5bn during the period.

PFA said the influx of new customers and good investment results resulted in customer funds increasing by DKK 65bn from DKK 583bn after the first half of 2023 to DKK 648bn after six months of 2024. In the first six months of 2024 alone, customer funds increased by DKK 34bn.

In the first six months of 2024, PFA had a net increase of 567 corporate and organisational customers. This is an increase of 17 per cent compared to the same period last year when the number was 485.

"It is a great vote of confidence that we experience a large influx of customers year after year. We are proud that so many customers choose PFA as a customer community. The high growth in contributions and the large net influx of customers show that we are strong in the market with a good overall value proposition for customers.

"The cornerstones of our value proposition are financial security, good healthcare solutions and social responsibility, which are also areas that are in demand among our 1.3 million customers and thus in society. These are also the areas where we will focus and improve further in the coming years," Krogh Petersen said.

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