What is a Fraternal Benefit Society?
A Fraternal Benefit Society is an institution that has a representative form of government and is operated for benevolent purposes, which include providing insurance benefits to its members, their spouses/common-law partners, and/or children to protect against accident, sickness, disability, or death.
Serving others is at the heart of what we do, and we reach our goals to give back through a variety of programs that aim to improve the quality of life in local communities and around the world.
To recap, Fraternal organizations are defined as:
- Providing insurance and investment products
- Having members instead of shareholders
- Sharing a common bond with their members
- Using profits to fund member benefits and to give back to the causes members care about
Serenia Life Financial is federally supervised by the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) and is subject to the same regulations as other Canadian life and health insurers.
The Society regularly monitors the amount of its available capital. The amount of capital deployed is dependent upon regulatory requirements as well as the Society’s internal assessment of capital requirements in the context of its policies in force, investments, operational risks, normal operational requirements, and strategic plans. The Society’s practice is to maintain capital at a level that will exceed the relevant minimum regulatory capital requirements and the Society’s internal target capital levels.
In Canada, OSFI has established a capital adequacy measurement for life insurance companies incorporated under the Insurance Companies Act (Canada) and their subsidiaries, known as the Life Insurance Capital Adequacy Test (LICAT). LICAT establishes the standards used by OSFI to assess whether a life insurer maintains adequate capital or an adequate margin to support risks specific to the life insurance business.
OSFI has established supervisory target levels of 100% for total ratio and 70% for core ratio. Serenia Life Financial continued to be well capitalized in 2023 with a total ratio of 216%, up 63% from 2022’s 153%. Our core ratio was 119%, which was up 32% versus our 2022 result of 87%.
To read more about the company’s 2023 financial and capital ratio results, please review our 2023 Audited Annual Financial Statements (see below).