LIC to invest Rs200,000 crore across asset classes

State-owned Life Insurance Corp of India (LIC), the country's largest money manager, plans to invest Rs2,00,000 crore across asset classes in the current fiscal year, up from the Rs1,92,000 crore it invested last fiscal.

"We have internally targeted to invest Rs2 lakh crore across asset classes by end-this fiscal," LIC chairman, T S Vijayan told reporters in Mumbai today while after announcing a valuation surplus on investments of over Rs23,000 crore last fiscal.

The targeted premium collection for the year is Rs 201,000 crore, he said.

In the first quarter of 2010-11, LIC invested Rs39,000 crore, of which Rs10,000 crore was in equities, he said.

Vijayan, however, refused to give the equity component of the targeted Rs200,000 crore investment, saying it depends on the premium collection from the controversial unit-linked insurance policies (ULIP)s.

For 2009-10, ULIPs' share in the total premium pie of Rs185,000 crore was 75 per cent and the total equity investments made by LIC stood at Rs61,000 crore. If the markets are good, people invest in ULIPs and if the interest rates are good, their preferences turn to non-linked policies, Vijayan said.