No plans to leave Venezuela, says Mapfre

Spanish insurance giant Mapfre is not planning to exit Venezuela despite the challenging operating conditions in the country, according to company VP Esteban Tejera.

"We are not thinking about leaving Venezuela or another country in Latin America" due to the short-term situation, Tejera said in a conference call with investors.

Mapfre reported 48.7% premium growth in Venezuela for the first nine months of this year in local currency terms.

However, the company's premium growth is below inflation, which the IMF estimates will reach 64.3% in the South American country this year.

In June, Mapfre adopted Venezuela's Sicad 1 parallel exchange rate at 12 bolívares per US dollar, almost double the official rate of 6.3 bolívares, leading to much lower premium growth in euro terms.

With 731mn euros (US$908mn) in written premiums in the first nine months of this year, Venezuela remains the company's largest Latin American market after Brazil.

Mapfre has received a "significant" amount of dividends from Venezuela over the years, finance director Luigi Lubelli said.

In the case of a default, it could be a problem getting dividends out of the country, according to Tejera.

However, it remains to be seen if this will happen, and how long the situation would last, he added.

Mapfre reported 2.2% written premium growth in the first nine months of this year on the back of strong results in Brazil and Mexico.