AIA Group's 2025 annual report reveals a 15% increase in Value of New Business (VONB), reaching a record $5.516 billion. Operating Profit After Tax (OPAT) grew by 12%, alongside the announcement of a new $1.7 billion share buyback program. The results are impressive.
While the data is strong, it highlights a concentrated growth story. Hong Kong alone contributed 61% of the group's VONB increase, accounting for $800 million of the absolute growth, while other markets are navigating their own periods of adjustment and transformation. Without Hong Kong's explosive growth, AIA's 2025 results would have been significantly less remarkable.
(All figures in USD millions, %)
Key Insights at a Glance
Hong Kong stands as the unequivocal primary growth driver, with VONB reaching $2.256 billion, a 28% growth rate, representing 40.9% of the group total. The VONB margin improved to 68.5% (+3.0 percentage points), with a five-year Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 31.4%. In essence, the market's value has nearly quadrupled in four years.
Mainland China is experiencing a painful transition between old and new growth drivers. Once a dual engine alongside Hong Kong, its VONB reached only $1.240 billion, growing a mere 2%. Annualised New Premium (ANP) contracted by 0.7% year-on-year to $2.152 billion. Although the value margin recovered to 57.6% (up 6.3 percentage points from the 2023 low), short-term growth momentum has clearly weakened. The focus is now on "digesting existing business and laying the groundwork for future growth."
Southeast Asian markets are playing the role of a "diversification balancer." Thailand excels on value (VONB margin surged to 110.9%), Singapore wins on scale (margin compressed to 47.0% in exchange for a 26% surge in ANP), and Malaysia focuses on protection (over 90% of products are protection-oriented).
The real growth logic for AIA in 2025 can be depicted across three dimensions: value, channels, and products.
1. Holistic View: High reliance on a single market serves as both an anchor for current performance and a potential source of future volatility. AIA's group VONB grew 15% year-on-year (at constant exchange rates), a result of both volume and price increases. However, the contributors to "volume" and "price" came from entirely different markets.
Volume is highly concentrated in Annualised New Premium (ANP): Hong Kong's ANP surged 25.8% to $3.283 billion (an increase of $674 million), accounting for 76.8% of the group's total ANP increment. Singapore's ANP grew 25.7% to $1.128 billion, contributing an increment of $231 million. Together, these two markets contributed 103% of the group's ANP growth—meaning other markets were essentially flat or in contraction.
Price improvements stem from policy and structure—New Business Margin (NBM): The group's margin improvement was primarily driven by product mix optimization in Thailand (+11.4 percentage points) and Hong Kong (+3.0 percentage points), alongside a 6.3 percentage point margin recovery in Mainland China due to regulatory premium rate adjustments (rebounding from the 2023 low of 51.3%). Excluding Hong Kong, the group's ANP growth would drop to 3%, and VONB growth would fall from 28% to 10%.
2. Market Breakdown: Who is celebrating? Who is adjusting? a) Hong Kong: The Unshakeable Core Growth Engine Core Characteristics: VONB grew 28%, contributing a massive 41% to group VONB. It is the group's only core market achieving double-digit growth in both scale and margin—the absolute primary growth pole. Value: With $2.256 billion in VONB and 28% year-on-year growth, Hong Kong was decisively the key to AIA's 2025 success. The VONB margin reached 68.5%, up 3.0 percentage points year-on-year. It has now exceeded the Mainland China margin for three consecutive years (2023-2025), with the gap widening from 6.2 percentage points in 2023 to 10.9 percentage points in 2025. This "scale + margin" dual growth is driven by two factors: Historic breakthrough from Mainland Chinese Visitors (MCV): MCV VONB grew 35% to $1.172 billion, surpassing local customer VONB ($1.084 billion, +21%) for the first time in history. 65% of MCV clients came from outside the Greater Bay Area, indicating deeper geographic penetration. The average number of policies per MCV client was 1.7 (lower than the 2.7 for local clients), and 95% of ANP came from regular premium policies (not single-premium). This suggests mainland mid-to-high net-worth individuals are treating Hong Kong policies as "core assets" for family wealth allocation, entering cautiously with significant room for further penetration. Resilient recovery in local protection demand: Local customer VONB grew 21%, with 75% of policy counts coming from protection products (non-savings/investment). New customers contributed $412 million in VONB, becoming a new growth pole. Hong Kong is shifting from a "wealth management mindset" to a "protection mindset," a potentially more sustainable underlying trend than the MCV surge. Channels: Premier Agency (individual life): Contributed $1.6 billion VONB, 70% of the total, growing 26% year-on-year. The number of active agents increased 9%, demonstrating strong productivity and professionalism. Partner Distribution (bancassurance/brokerage): Contributed $700 million VONB, 30% of the total, growing 46% year-on-year. Brokerage channel grew +49%, and bancassurance grew +41%, showing balanced multi-channel development. Products: The launch of a key mid-term flagship product early in the year drove a 26% increase in related ANP, lifting the overall margin by 4.2 percentage points. Conclusion: A "twin-engine" drive combining recovering local protection demand and sustained high回流 of mainland visitors, supported by strong long-term savings and protection needs from high-net-worth clients.
b) Mainland China: Structural Repair, Barely Treading Water Core Characteristics: Compared to Hong Kong's heat, the mainland market is in a difficult gear-shifting period. Full-year VONB was only $1.240 billion, up a slight 2%. More significantly, ANP contracted by 0.7% to $2.152 billion—a rare "volume contraction" for AIA's mainland business. The growth logic has fundamentally shifted from agent force expansion (active agents increased +8%, new recruits +14%, yet ANP was negative) to reliance on margin recovery (VONB margin +1.5 percentage points to 57.6%) and product mix optimization (protection and participating savings products each accounted for 44%, tax-advantaged products 9%). Value: VONB growth was -5% in the first half but strongly recovered to +14% in the second half. This growth was driven not by scale expansion (ANP -0.7%) but by margin repair. The NBM has recovered 6.3 percentage points from the 2023 low (51.3%), mainly due to regulatory premium rate adjustments and a shift towards products like participating insurance. Channels: Premier Agency: Contributed 85% of VONB, with margins stable around 65%. The total number of active agents increased 8%, and new agent recruits increased 14%. Bancassurance: Contributed 15% of VONB, with margins stable around 35%. By focusing on affluent and high-net-worth customers, it achieved higher average policy premiums, defending the value bottom line. Products: For agency channel VONB, the product mix was led by protection (44%) and participating savings (44%), with a small portion from tax-advantaged products (9%). Conclusion: The traditional scale expansion model has失效. Growth now depends on: margin recovery + expansion into new regions + deepening existing client relationships. However, cultivating new regions takes time.
c) Thailand: A Margin Miracle, Powered by "Medical Insurance" Core Characteristics: The market with the group's highest NBM, reaching an extraordinary 110.9% in 2025. VONB grew 22% year-on-year. Value: The NBM increased by 11.4 percentage points to 110.9%, while ANP grew only 2%, indicating this is not a sustainable norm. The core reason was a surge in sales ahead of the March 2025 introduction of new co-payment rules for individual medical insurance products, leading to exceptionally strong Q1 growth. AIA has directly stated that Q1 2026 VONB will consequently see a year-on-year decline. Channels: The Financial Advisor (FA) system is the core driver, contributing over 40% of agency channel VONB, with per capita productivity three times that of standard agents, reflecting years of channel specialization and elitization. Conclusion: Thailand's super-high margins are driven by short-term policy changes and are unsustainable. However, this highlights AIA's absolute leadership in the health and protection market (50%+ market share in medical insurance) and successful channel upgrade.
d) Singapore: Sacrificing Margin for Scale Core Characteristics: Chose an expansion path of "trading price for volume." VONB reached $530 million (+17%), but the VONB margin plummeted from 67.2% in 2023 to 47.0% (down 3.5 percentage points year-on-year), the lowest among major group markets. ANP surged 25.7% to $1.128 billion, marking four consecutive years of 10%+ growth, primarily driven by strong demand for savings products from high-net-worth clients. Value: This is an inevitable result of the product mix tilting towards savings; unit-linked and participating products contributed over half the VONB, pulling down the overall margin. Channels: Partner channel growth (+31%) outpaced agency growth (+10%), underscoring the importance of bank partnerships in the high-net-worth market. Conclusion: Singapore traded margin for valuable scale growth, successfully capturing wealth management demand from the affluent. This may be a precise "trade-off," but whether a 47% margin can support long-term value creation requires ongoing observation.
e) Malaysia: Structure-Driven, Profit-First Core Characteristics: NBM reached 72.2%, with protection products comprising over 90% of the mix. However, it faces a balance between scale and value: ANP was essentially flat at $515 million (-0.4%), with a five-year CAGR of only 1.2%. The agency channel faced challenges early in the year, leading the company to focus resources on serving existing clients. Value: VONB was $373 million (+7%), and NBM remained above 70% for two consecutive years, defending the quality high ground. Channels: The partner channel was a bright spot, with VONB growing 17%. The long-term strategic cooperation with Public Bank serves as a stabilizer and growth point. Conclusion: The Malaysian market sacrificed short-term scale to solidify business quality and maintain high profitability. This "substance-over-size" strategy may be more resilient but could also face market ceiling limitations.
This was a bumper year for Hong Kong, while other markets continue to explore and progress on their respective paths.
3. Future Questions: How Far is the Journey from a Single Engine to Multiple Drivers? Can Hong Kong maintain high growth on a high base? It is likely to continue benefiting from its position. In Mainland China, with negative ANP growth, relying solely on margin recovery (57.6%) and contributions from new regions (9.5% share) seems unsustainable. When will it emerge from this adjustment period and resume dual growth in scale and value? In Thailand, after the policy红利 fades, how will it fill the growth gap? What is the next growth driver after medical insurance? Can Singapore and Malaysia achieve a rebalancing of scale and value? One has a margin of only 47% (too low), the other has ANP growth of -0.4% (too slow); both need to find new breakthroughs. What AIA truly needs is the day when multiple engines ignite simultaneously.