FINANCIAL LIBERALISATION AND PERFORMANCE IN THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY

The insurance industry plays a very important role in the economies of all countries by providing mechanisms for pulling risk. Because of the nature of the non-financial sector, governments intervene in the insurance industry in several ways. However, the government intervention has created inefficient and uncompetitive insurance industry during financial repression. As result, the many countries including Ghana adopted financial sector liberalisation policies in 1980s. This study adopts Structure-Conduct-Performance to assess the impact of financial sector liberalisation on profitability indicators of five major insurance companies in Ghana. The results show that the financial sector liberalisation improves upon the performance of insurance companies. However, other aspects of the insurance industry like human resource management should be improved.