1000

Clergy Mortality.

The ordinate represents the number living at any age out of 1000 living at 25.

950

900

850

800

750

700

650

600

550

500

450

4.00

350

25

25

30

35

40

45

50

Age.

The Growth of Life Companies.

[From the Spectator of New York and Chicago.]

THE history of life insurance in England shows that it is to the

degree of activity with which new business is sought, and not to superiority in age, that companies owe their ability to show large accumulations of assets. We reprint from the London Review the

names and assets of the ten leading English life companies, in

round figures.

It will be seen that length of duration is a secondary agent in developing the assets of an English company.

A comparison with the ten American companies having the largest assets shows the same result; that their relative rank in the list is the consequence of activity in the pursuit of new business and not of prior organizing. The following are the American companies with their assets, 31 December 1873, in round figures:

These tables also illustrate the more rapid growth of the business of life insurance in America than in England. The total ages of the ten English companies enumerated above are exactly 600 years, and during those years they have accumulated assets to the amount of £36,600,000. The total years of the American companies are 256, and in that time they have accumulated assets of £49,180,000.

HOME AND FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE.

THE SCOTTISH EQUITABLE LIFE ASSURANCE SOCIETY. Established 1831.

EXTRACT FROM REPORT BY THE DIRECTORS.

Position and Progress of the Business.

The Society's position at the end of its forty-second year is as follows:

Number of Policies in Force (on the Lives of 9399

The progressive increase of the business during the last thirty years is exhibited in the following table:

The Directors have now to report the results of the Eleventh Investigation into the affairs of the Society, with the view to the declaration of a bonus. While the present investigation is the second which has been conducted on the principles of the altered constitution adopted in 1867, it is the first which has taken place after an interval of five years as therein provided.

Report of the Committee of Directors appointed to make the Eleventh Investigation into the Affairs of the Scottish Equitable Life Assurance Society, as at 1st March 1873.

The valuations of the assets and liabilities under the whole policies in force at 1st March 1873, have been conducted on principles

similar to those adopted in 1868, and the whole plan of the investigation was arranged, and many of its details were completed, under the immediate superintendence of their lamented Manager, before his last illness incapacitated him from attending to the Society's affairs. The investigation was completed by Mr. Finlay.

In submitting to the Court of Directors the results of the investigation, the Committee have to explain that the valuations of the assets and liabilities, so far as they depend on life contingencies, have been made on the basis of the Carlisle table of mortality, the rate of interest assumed in all the calculations being 3 per-cent, excepting in the valuations of the vested bonus additions to existing assurances, in which, as provided in the altered Constitution, the rate of 34 per-cent interest has been assumed. In the participating assurances (being nineteen-twentieths of the whole business) the loading reserved is 26 per-cent of the value of the net premiums. In non-participating assurances the loading reserved is 134 per-cent of the net premiums. The annual sum thus reserved in making the valuation of the premiums is £35,299, and the present value thereof is £516,684. The Committee now submit the following Valuation BalanceSheet:

In estimating the surplus which has arisen during the period since 1st March 1868, the contingent prospective additions which have been paid on policies becoming claims during that period must also be taken into account. These amount to £13,548, making, with the above sum now available for division, the total estimated surplus of the Quinquennium £192,236.

The whole of the above surplus of £178,688. 15s. 2d. now falls to be allocated in retrospective additions to all the participating policies in force at the date of investigation, and it will yield a reversionary bonus of £1 per centum per annum, amounting to an addition of £306,818 to the sums assured under all the policies of the Society, and payable at the death of the parties entitled thereto. This addition, as required by the resolutions of 1867, will be allocated in

the case of policies to which additions have previously been made, not only on the sums originally assured, but also on the previously vested additions (not surrendered at the date of this investigation), and that for the five years since last investigation, at 1st March 1868, and in the case of policies which have not previously received additions,— that is, all policies issued since 1st March 1868, on the amount originally assured; and that for the number of years such policies shall have existed previous to 1st March 1873. These additions, in terms of the said resolutions, became vested at 1st March last in the case of all policies which were then of five years' standing and upwards; but in the case of each policy which was then of less than five years' standing, the additions will not become vested until such policy shall have been in force for five complete years.

The Committee also recommend, in accordance with the said resolutions, that besides the above retrospective additions, contingent prospective additions be made to all participating policies which may become claims between 1st March 1873 and 1st March 1878 (the date at which the next investigation falls to be made), and which, at the date of their so becoming claims, shall be of not less than five years' standing, and that at the rate of 15s, per-cent, being three-fourths of the retrospective additions now recommended; and that these contingent prospective additions be in proportion to the sums assured (including previously vested additions), and to the duration of the policies since 1st March 1873, and be charged upon, and paid out of, the surplus fund to be realized up to the period at which these contingent prospective additions shall become payable.

be

The Committee further recommend that vested additions may surrendered by members, in whole or in part, for a present sum in money, or that these additions may be applied in extinction or reduction of the premiums payable for a period of five years, or for the remainder of the duration of the life assured; and that at the rates contained in the table already sanctioned by the Society.

The foregoing Report having been taken into consideration at a Court of Ordinary Directors held on 26th June, was unanimously approved of, and the Board of Directors allocated the vested additions and contingent prospective additions recommended by the Committee.

It was also resolved that these vested additions, as well as those formerly declared, may be at any time surrendered for their cash value, or may be applied to reduce the annual premiums payable by policyholders, either for a period of five years, or for the remainder of the lives assured at the rates contained in the table already sanctioned by the Society.

The bonus now declared is nominally at the rate of £1 per-cent, but it will be kept in view that being allocated on the original sums assured, accumulated with the previously vested additions, it is equivalent to a bonus at the rate of £1. 16s. 10d. per annum on each £100 assured in the First year of the Society, of £1. 14s. 4d. on each £100 of the Fifth year, and of £1. 11s. 2d. on each policy of the Tenth year of the Society, and proportionally on policies of subsequent years.

The Directors may further state that the additions declared at this and the previous investigations amount to £2,012,982, and a policy