MetLife, Inc. - Analyst/Investor Day

In terms of the numbers, just to give you a quick snap shot of the business we have today, overall for Asia, you see we have operating revenue of USD 9 billion. But more importantly, nearly $900 million of operating earnings. In Japan, we're the #2 foreign life insurer, and #2 in accident and health products. We're the #1 foreign life insurer in Korea. And we continue to our presence in China, which again, is a key emerging market for us. We just called out the 2 most important markets for us in the region, that being Japan and Korea, both that you would appreciate are mature markets and we manage them accordingly and appropriately.

So Japan is the second-largest market for the MetLife [indiscernible] in the United States. And we've got strong growth in some high-margin products, despite the challenging environment, and we look at Japan very much as a cornerstone or launch pad for us for the rest of our Asia strategy. And Bill is obviously going to talk more about that very shortly.

If we turn to Korea, it's our fourth biggest market in the world. And we're using a diverse distribution platform there centered around a strong career agency force, which has been the backbone of our business there for a couple decades. If you look at Korea, obviously, the aging population does create a significant opportunity for us in the accident health products, and since we've launched those, we've had some very good success from those products, and Jong Kim will talk to you those in more detail to explain how they're working.

We discussed the emerging markets in Asia. We are a top 5 insurance play in both direct marketing and bancassurance in China. You'll see from the footnote there, that 2011 data, and having spent most of last there, I'm pleased to tell you that the actual numbers, since that, and for the first part of 2012, shows a much better light, so what we're doing is working well in China. We're also expanding the agency model in the more Chinese provinces, the more cities, and then Bob Pei will explain how we've taken advantage of the opportunities in China.

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