March 7 (Reuters) - British insurer esure Group Plcreported on Wednesday a better-than-expected 35.6 percent risein full-year pretax profit, driven by an increase in demand forits motor insurance products.
Gross written premiums rose 25.2 percent to 820.2 millionpounds in the year and was above analysts' average estimate of813 million pounds. Motor gross written premiums rose 30.3percent to 734.3 million pounds in 2017, the company said.
Motor premiums rose in the first half of 2017, partly inresponse to the new rules for personal injury claims, butreversed course to fall in the next two quarters after
Combined operating ratio, a measure of underwritingprofitability, improved to 96.7 percent from 98.8 percent,against consensus estimates of 96.4 million pounds. A numberbelow 100 percent indicates a profit.
The insurer said it was targeting a similar combinedoperating ratio in 2018.
The insurer said pretax profit from continuing operationsrose to 98.6 million pounds (
Analysts on average were expecting a profit of 96.5 millionpounds, according to company-compiled estimates.(
(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Arathy S Nair inBengaluru; Editing by Amrutha Gayathri)