Insurance companies in South Korea saw their combined net profit surge 13 percent in the first nine months of the year on the back of increased sales and investment returns, data showed Tuesday.

The combined net profit of 22 life insurers and 31 non-life insurance companies in the country came to 13.4 trillion won ($9.53 billion) in the January-September period, up 1.56 trillion won, or 13.2 percent, from the same period last year, according to the data from the Financial Supervisory Service.

The on-year rise was attributed to an increase in investment returns due to high interest rates and increased sales, according to the financial watchdog.

Life insurance firms' net profit gained 12.6 percent on-year to 5.31 trillion won in the first three quarters of the year, with that of non-life insurers surging 13.6 percent, or 967 billion won, to 3.05 trillion won.

The companies' insurance premium income came to 170.01 trillion won in the January-September period, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier, the data showed.

The insurance firms' return on assets stood at 1.44 percent at end-September, up 0.07 percentage point from a year earlier, with their return on equity increasing 2.08 percentage points to 11.35 percent over the cited period.

Their total assets came to 1,257 trillion won as of end-September, up 30.7 trillion won, or 2.5 percent, from a year earlier. (Yonhap)