Aegon N.V. Chairman of the Executive Board Donald J. Shepard will detail new growth targets to be achieved by 2010 for the Aegon Group during the company's Analyst & Investor Conference in New York, which begins this afternoon and continues throughout tomorrow. Mr. Shepard will be joined by other members of the Executive Board and senior management in highlighting the growth initiatives underway across Aegon's businesses internationally. Patrick S. Baird, CEO of Aegon Americas, will highlight developments and discuss targets for Aegon Americas as a whole. The program will also include a number of small group meetings with members of the Executive Board, senior management of various country units and Group Staff.
"Aegon's results over the past couple of years have provided clear evidence of our ongoing commitment to enhancing profitability, with significant increases in the value of new business and consistent improvements in our internal rate of return," said Mr. Shepard. "Going forward, we will be focusing on several global initiatives, such as our growing international pension operations, to leverage further Aegon's leading position in the life insurance and pensions business. We believe that these new targets for Aegon are consistent with the strong growth potential of our established and developing markets. We're glad to have this opportunity to discuss with the investment community the progress we are continuing to make across Aegon's businesses."
Aegon Group
Today, Aegon publishes targets for the Value of New Business (VNB) of the entire Group. Based on ambitious, yet realistic business plans, Aegon expects that its VNB will double from 2005 to reach EUR 1.1 billion by 2010, an average annual increase of approximately 15%. Certain aspects of these business plans and the related targets were presented at the Analyst & Investor Conference held in May of this year. The targets for Aegon Americas and the Aegon Group as a whole reflect Aegon's strong position to capture growth opportunities in North America, Europe and Asia.
Aegon expects the share of total VNB coming from Asia, Central and Eastern Europe and Other European Countries to reach 25-30% by 2010. However, Aegon expects that continued additional investments in these areas will increase their total VNB to between 30 and 35 percent of Aegon's total VNB over time.
Aegon Americas
Aegon Americas aims to grow its VNB to USD 625 million by 2010, an average annual growth rate of 13% from 2005. The drivers of this are organic growth in its domestic markets as well as further expansion of its international capabilities. "We have positioned ourselves for double-digit VNB growth in almost all of our lines of business in the Americas," said Mr. Baird. "We foresee strong growth in our individual savings and retirement business, our pension business, in life and protection and in our institutional business. Additionally, we believe our reinsurance business will continue to be a leader in its domestic market and expand internationally."
Program
The program for this conference is as follows (all times US EST):
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 2006
5:30 pm Opening and welcome Michiel van Katwijk,
Executive Vice President & Group Treasurer, Aegon N.V.
5:35 pm Aegon Group: Growing the Value
Don Shepard, Chairman of the Executive Board, Aegon N.V.
6:05 pm Aegon Group: Pension/Retirement Initiatives
Alex Wynaendts, member of the Executive Board, Aegon N.V.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 2006
8:00 am Aegon USA: Growing the Value
Pat Baird, President & CEO, Aegon USA
8:45 am Aegon USA: Pension/Retirement Initiatives
Mark Mullin, Executive Vice President, Aegon USA, and
CEO Diversified Investment Advisors
9:30 am Aegon Group: International Bancassurance Initiatives
Larry Norman, President, Aegon Financial Services Group
10:30 am Small group meetings:
remainder of the day
All targets and objectives mentioned are based on current economic and business assumptions and assume a neutral effect from currency movements.
The presentations will be audio cast live and slides of the presentations will be available on www.Aegon.com.
