Today, the director of the Behavioral Supervision Department of the Insurance and Pension Funds Supervisory Authority (ASF) presented journalists with a comparison tool available on the ASF website, predicting it will “increase the transparency of the PPR market, enhance consumer knowledge,” potentially making the market more competitive and reducing consumer costs.
“In theory, the greater the transparency, the more attractive the offer,” stated Eduardo Pereira.
When asked whether greater comparability between products might also boost the market and increase PPR subscriptions due to consumers feeling more secure, Eduardo Pereira acknowledged that this could indeed happen.
“It develops the ability to choose and search for products,” he remarked.
This centralized database results from PPR information that operators must provide to ASF, which is mandatory and annually updated.
The comparator includes all currently marketed PPRs, over 100, as well as all active PPRs no longer available for sale.
With this platform, consumers can compare products before subscribing to a PPR and, after subscription, compare their PPR’s performance (specifically profitability) against others.
PPRs under scrutiny include life insurance not linked to investment funds (products that guarantee capital and may guarantee profitability), life insurance linked to investment funds (typically not guaranteeing capital or profitability), and pension funds (may or may not guarantee capital and profitability).
According to the ASF’s 2023 report (latest available year), the amount invested in PPR products reached 17.4 billion euros, a decrease of 7.8% compared to 2022.
In 2023, the total volume of premiums and contributions for PPRs fell by 18.8% to 1.7 billion euros, which, according to the insurance regulator, represented “the lowest value recorded in recent years.”
