A look at insurers annual reports
INTEGRATED REPORTING: 
HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?

MAZARS IS AN INTERNATIONAL, INTEGRATED AND INDEPENDENT ORGANIZATION, SPECIALIZED IN AUDIT, 
ACCOUNTANCY, TAX, LEGAL AND ADVISORY SERVICES. THE GROUP DRAWS ON THE EXPERTISE OF OVER 
15,000 PROFESSIONALS TO ASSIST MAJOR INTERNATIONAL GROUPS, SMEs, PRIVATE INVESTORS AND 
PUBLIC BODIES IN 73 COUNTRIES WHICH ARE PART OF ITS INTEGRATED PARTNERSHIP.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
3
Introduction	
4
The Integrated report, a three steps journey	
6
Insurers’ Integrated reports: good practices that are still
being perfected	
7
Determining factors of an Integrated report	
7
Integrated reports present their value creation process in 
the context of their external environment	
9
In-depth analysis of insurers reports’ strengths and weaknesses	
12
General aspects	
12
Guiding principles	
12
Content elements	
17
Areas of improvement	
19
Conclusion	
22
TABLE OF CONTENTS

4
 
INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
This study has been prepared by Mazars 
with  inputs from <IR> Insurance Network 
participants. Mazars is an international, 
integrated and independent organization, 
specialized in audit, accountancy, tax, legal and 
advisory services. The <IR> Insurance Network is 
coordinated by the Aegon, Generali and Mazars 
with inputs from insurers and reinsurers from 
different countries. 
The aim of an Integrated report is to represent 
the underlying long-term value creation factors 
of a company. There are clear benefits for both 
the stakeholders reading the report and the 
companies which publish it – but it can often 
be a challenge in its realisation. Compared 
to traditional financial reports, Integrated 
Reporting is a significant change in the way 
corporate reporting is designed. Yet, our study 
of insurers’ reports underlines the fact that 
Integrated reports are not created ex nihilo but 
based on various concepts partially treated in 
financial and corporate social responsibility 
(hereinafter referred to as “CSR”) reports. 
This study aims at identifying the differences 
between financial reports, management 
reports and Integrated reports and then to 
present the industry best practices in terms 
of reporting and communication.
Our analysis is based on a qualitative 
benchmark done on 2013 and 2014 annual 
reports published by insurers and reinsurers 
(the list of the companies can be found in 
the figure below). Mazars selected a panel 
of 22 reports and split them into 3 different 
categories (Integrated reports, management 
reports that include CSR elements and strictly 
financial reports). This approach was taken 
in order to have a balanced representation in 
terms of activities, typologies of documents 
and geographical location. 
Given the relatively small panel that was 
selected, it should be made clear that the study 
does not aim to represent the percentage of 
each different practice but to identify trends 
and key features in current insurers and 
reinsurers reporting.
The companies for which the reports were 
analyzed are presented below:
INTRODUCTION
• Aegon
• Generali
• Nedbank Group
• SANLAM
• Zurich Insurance 
Company South Africa 
Limited
• Allianz Group
• Aviva plc
• AXA Group
• Japan Post Group
• MAPFRE
• Munich Re
• Old Mutual
• Porto Seguros
• Prudential plc
• AIG
• China Life Insurance 
Company Limited
• China Taiping Insurance 
Holdings Company 
Limited
• MetLife, Inc.
• PartnerRE 
• Prudential Financial
• Ping An Insurance Group
• Zurich Insurance Group
Strictly financial report
Integrated Report
Management report 
combining financial and
CSR information
5 reports
(23% of the panel)
9 reports
(41% of the panel)
8 reports
(36% of the panel)

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
5
The maturity of reporting practices were 
analyzed through an assessment matrix 
inspired by the International <IR> Framework, 
complemented with Mazars’ insights on 
financial and pre-financial1 reporting practices 
and approved by the <IR> Insurance Network 
participants. 
All reports were first qualitatively 
characterized following 60 criteria of an 
assessment matrix. Considering the observed 
characteristics on these 60 criteria, we then 
attributed a maturity level (each criteria was 
rated on a 1 to 5 scale to allow quantitative 
analysis). For the purpose of the analysis 
we then consolidated the 60 criteria into 
15 categories (the level of maturity of each 
category being the average of the scores of 
the corresponding criteria).
1: “Pre-financial” is meant here to substitute the term “non-financial” when referring to all sets of information which presently do not have a “monetary 
value” but that, in the future, will have an impact on the financial status of the company.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
6
The general maturity level by cluster brings to 
light what we believe to be the main conclu­
sion of this benchmark: Integrated Reporting 
is not a complete paradigm shift but rather 
a 3-steps journey. Even if it seems that In­
tegrated Reporting introduces a few new 
reporting principles compared to traditional 
financial or CSR reporting, the most part of it 
consists in a continuation and improvement 
of current approaches. 
Following our analysis, management reports 
combining financial and CSR information 
appear to be halfway from financial and In­
tegrated reports and consist of a first step 
toward Integrated Reporting. In the table 
below, we can see that management reports 
combining financial and CSR information 
represent a significant enhancement com­
pared to financial reports with regard to the 
connectivity of the information, stakeholders 
relationships, materiality and conciseness. 
Financial reports appear to be the least ma­
ture of the 3 categories of reports that we 
surveyed in the application of the International 
<IR> Framework’s guidelines. Their main 
objective is mainly to respond to legal require­
ments, often meaning that conciseness and 
materiality are in fact not necessary (if not 
compromising) to comply with legal texts. On 
top of this, companies tend to communicate 
on their activities/ business model but are 
very cautious when it comes to their risks, 
resources allocation and performance. 
Furthermore, Integrated Reporting is a long 
journey as only 2 clusters obtained a score 
of 5, giving room for further improvement.
THE INTEGRATED REPORT, A THREE 
STEPS JOURNEY
Integrated 
Report
Financial incl. 
CSR
Strictly 
financial
General information
4
2
1
Application of the framework & Structure of the report
4
0
0
Guiding principles
Strategic focus and future orientation
5
3
3
Connectivity of the information
4
3
1
Stakeholders relationships
3
3
1
Materiality
4
2
0
Conciseness
4
3
1
Reliability and completeness
3
3
4
Consistency and comparability
4
3
3
Content elements
Organizational overview and external 
environment
4
2
1
Governance
4
2
0
Business Model
5
4
2
Risks and opportunities
3
1
2
Strategy and resource allocation
2
2
1
Performance
2
1
0
Average maturity 
4
2
1
Score over 5
> = 4
2 - 4
< = 2

INSURERS’ INTEGRATED REPORTS: 
GOOD PRACTICES THAT ARE STILL 
BEING PERFECTED
Determining factors of an Integrated report
An Integrated report is a concise communication about “how an organization’s strategy, 
governance, performance and prospects, in the context of its external environment, lead 
to the creation of value in the short, medium and long terms”2. 
The content of an Integrated report is defined by the International <IR> Framework. This 
framework defines guidelines companies can follow – providing a structured set of capitals 
in which companies can demonstrate their value creation.
The objective of this study is to highlight the main differences between Integrated reports 
and financial/ CSR reports. 
One of the main determining factors of an Integrated report compared to traditional financial 
reports and CSR chapters is its approach to materiality (the selection of the most relevant 
issues in regards to their impact on the business and interest for stakeholders). An Integrated 
report takes the form of a more selective and hierarchical disclosure of financial and pre-
financial information in order to improve overall relevance and consistency. 
Regarding pre-financial issues, selectivity represents a major challenge for CSR depart­
ments: to distinguish the essential from the incidental given the plethora of stakeholders’ 
expectations and interests. 
Several tools exist to manage this, such as materiality matrices (detailed or not in the 
report itself).
INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
7
2: Source : IIRC

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
8
 
In addition to the International <IR> Framework, Integrated reports refer more frequently 
to other frameworks than the rest of the panel (Global Reporting Initiative, Sustainability 
Accounting Standards Board, European Federation of Financial Analysts Societies etc.). The 
use of Integrated Reporting principles and other frameworks are not mutually exclusive. 
We believe this is a sign of the overall thinking concerning their reporting practices. The 
use of external standards and guidelines such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) usu­
ally facilitates the comparison within and between sectors. Yet, these good practices are 
still far from systematic: only about 40% of the global panel and 80% of Integrated reports 
refer to such external frameworks.
Lastly, it appears that the preparation of Integrated reports is supported by the highest level 
of authority within an organization as they frequently include a “responsibility” statement 
from those in charge of governance. It gives the approach some credibility and guarantees 
the accuracy of the provided information (especially regarding strategic information).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Integrated reports present their value creation process in 
the context of their external environment
Integrated Thinking provides companies the opportunity to put into perspective their 
activities and present their organization as a system where interdependences of different 
factors and variables are key to value creation. As a consequence, connectivity of informa­
tion is one of the main areas of differentiation of Integrated reports. 
Integrated reports also give a clearer picture of the business model from a future outlook 
perspective. In each Integrated report we analyzed, the strategy and business model are 
strongly linked to future outlook and risks & opportunities. By comparison, 73% of the total 
panel (including Integrated reports) does not.
Finance departments have mastered the description of their past activities in traditional 
annual (financial) reports as it is often explicitly required by law (e.g. US Form 10-K, French 
Registration Document etc.). However, the overall plan implemented by the company to create 
value in the long term is not always clearly described. Integrated Reporting encourages 
less narrative and representation through the use of simple diagrams to visualize the value 
creation process.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 1 : Zurich Insurance Group Business Model, Annual Report 2014
Another concept of Integrated Reporting is to describe the relationships with key stakeholders. 
While this is largely non-existent within traditional financial reports, stakeholder relation­
ships are increasingly introduced in CSR chapters of financial reports and CSR standalone 
reports, often in the form of stakeholders’ mapping: these mappings are presented in more 
than 60% of our panel of insurers and reinsurers’ reports. This information is sometimes 
supplemented with the description of their involvement in the value creation process.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 2 : Representation of the links between internal stakeholders and value creation, 
AXA 2014 Activity and Corporate Responsibility Report
Finally, the Integrated reports that made up our panel stand out by the way they describe 
and analyze their competitive landscape and the company’s position in the value chain. This 
type of information was present in more than 75% of Integrated reports and less than 50% 
of the total panel.
As we will see in the 3rd part of the study below, and despite the clear benefits previously 
mentioned, current Integrated Reporting practices still offer potential areas of improvement:
§§ Risk and opportunities are often identified and extensively described, however criticality 
analysis and detailed mitigation measures lack details.
§§ If strategic objectives are often well described on different time scales, the link with re­
source allocation could be better in the Integrated report.
§§ The publication of integrated performance indicators is generally poor.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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General aspects
Our study reveals that the structure and logical flow of the insurers’ reports most often 
follows a logic specific to the company and rarely follows content elements or material 
issues. Still, Integrated reports tend to have a more consistent and easier to read structure, 
based on a mix of certain content elements such as the external environment, the value 
creation process and a materiality based approach. 
As mentioned earlier in this document, a number of elements required by the International <IR> 
Framework are introduced in management reports combining financial and CSR information 
and from an Integrated Thinking point of view, constitute a significant improvement compared 
to traditional financial reports. However, such documents tend to contain overlapping 
information within their different parts. As an example, risks are often addressed in a 
dedicated part as for usual financial reports but also included in the CSR chapter. This overlap 
finds its root cause in a compartmentalization of responsibilities during the preparation of 
the reports implying an environmental, social and governance risks analysis done by CSR 
experts and sometimes isolated from the wider context of the general risk assessment.
Guiding principles
Strategic focus and future orientation:
One concept of the Integrated Reporting approach is to provide comprehensive information 
about organization strategy and future outlook. If these elements are usually partially 
covered in current financial documents, they are often not developed or simply mentioned 
in traditional CSR reports. 
IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF INSURERS 
REPORTS’ STRENGTHS AND 
WEAKNESSES

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Most often, the organization’s strategy is included in a dedicated chapter (>70% of the panel), 
but future orientated information is either spread throughout the document or concentrated 
in a specific chapter. If these topics are most often well described, we observe that current 
reporting practices lack holistic presentation of resource allocation plans linked to this 
strategy (<10% of the panel).
Figure 3: Representation of the components of strategy and related targets, Aegon’s 
2014 Review

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Connectivity of the information:
Generally speaking, a significant area of improvement of current insurers reporting could 
be the connectivity of information (<25% of the panel demonstrates a strong connectivity). 
This area of improvement more specifically concerns interconnections between the strategy, 
the value creation process, the risks & opportunities and the performance at different time 
scales. By contrast, the assessed Integrated reports connectivity was strong on these items.
The connectivity of Integrated reports is characterized, for instance, by clear explanations 
of the consistency between the long-term factors that affect the business and the ability to 
create value, the strategy and current activities.
Figure 4: Description of one long-term factor that affects the business and the ability 
to create value, Generali’s Annual Integrated Report 2014

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Materiality:
Material information is relevant information regarding something that has a remarkable 
impact on the value creation process of the company, and therefore, is likely to interest 
stakeholders. Materiality is one of the underlying concepts of Integrated Thinking and 
Reporting and a differentiating factor compared to financial reports. 
As trends and factors related to insurance markets’ evolutions can’t be exhaustively covered 
in the reports, materiality matrices provide transparency on the prioritization of issues. 
However, less than 20% of the panel presents this kind of matrix. 
The current coverage of the material trends factors in the insurers’ reports reveals three 
distinct groups. The most developed issues are financial market volatility and new regulations 
(group 1, see below). These issues are easily identified and have been focusing the attention 
of finance departments and governance bodies for a long time.
The second group is composed of some of the emerging material trends and is mainly 
developed in management reports combining financial and CSR information. 
Finally, the third group, composed of long term and hard to quantify material trends, is rarely 
addressed in insurers’ reports (<20% of the panel). 
Materials trends/ factors developed in the report (% of the panel)

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 5: Representation of material trends/ factors related to insurance markets’ 
evolution, Aviva CSR report 2014
Conciseness and readability:
Unlike traditional financial reports that are often perceived as long and difficult to read, 
Integrated reports distinguish themselves by their conciseness and the clarity of their 
content. From a strictly quantitative point of view, Integrated reports of the panel have on 
average almost 40% less pages than their strictly financial counterparts. This achievement 
can be linked to the materiality exercise, allowing companies to focus only on significant 
matters (reducing the number of pages).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Content elements
Organizational overview and external environment:
Organizational overview is extensively addressed from a descriptive point of view (>60% of 
the panel) but key evolutions in this organization are rarely linked to the strategy, especially 
for traditional financial reports (<40% of the panel). On these criteria, Integrated reports 
achieve a significantly better maturity level in comparison to other reports.
Governance
Integrated Reporting also has the advantage of providing a better outlook in terms of a 
company’s governance. In insurers and reinsurers reports, these elements are often 
extensively addressed from a descriptive point of view. For example, about 80% of the 
analyzed reports include elements on the governance structure and board and management 
members’ remuneration. However, due to this overly descriptive approach, the maturity of 
the governance related elements is generally low in financial reports. 
The role of governance bodies in the value creation process is rarely presented (less than 
half of the insurers’ reports we analyzed). This information can take the form of a synthetic 
representation of governance bodies, a presentation of their respective roles and their past/
current actions (and the impacts of these actions on the value creation of the company).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 6 : Generali’s governance bodies, Annual Integrated Report 2014
Business model:
The business model is relatively well described in all insurers’ reports through narratives, 
however, less than 50% of the panel use a simple diagram that highlights key elements of 
the value creation process (inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes). These kinds of synthetic 
representations are a significant area of differentiation of the Integrated reports as, in our 
panel, 80% of them present such a diagram (traditional financial reports mainly focus on 
activities).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 7: Holistic representation of the business model that includes the use of capitals, 
descriptions of activities, strategy and value creation (Sanlam annual report 2014)
Areas of improvement
Risk and opportunities:
Risk and opportunities are always identified and often extensively described in insurers and 
reinsurers’ reports. They are either addressed in a dedicated part (around 60% the panel) 
or throughout the report. However, critical analysis and mitigations measures, which are 
the most pertinent issues for investors and other stakeholders, often lack details (even in 
Integrated reports).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 8: Extract of a clear and readable risk matrix (Zurich Insurance Company South 
Africa ltd report 2013)
Strategy and resource allocation:
Similarly, if strategic objectives are generally well described on different time scales 
(>60% of the panel), the link with current and future resource allocation could be better 
for Integrated reports (<20% of Integrated reports) and is largely inexistent for other reports 
(<10% of the panel).

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Figure 9: Zurich Insurance Group 2014-2016 strategic cornerstones, Annual Report 2014
Performance:
The assessed management reports use different quantifiable measures to gauge performance 
in terms of meeting their strategic and operational objectives. 
In addition to traditional financial indicators, some of them try to associate pre-financial key 
performance indicators to major issues faced by the organization. However, we observe 
that only 27% of the entire panel (and 60% of Integrated reports) disclose ESG performance 
indicators that exceed strictly CSR concerns and are directly business relevant.
Indicators found in Integrated reports vary with companies’ strategy (an indicator should 
reflect the strategy implementation or results) and companies’ choices on typology of 
information disclosed.

INTEGRATED REPORTING: HOW FAR HAVE WE COME?
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Integrated Reporting is not a complete paradigm shift but a continuation and improvement 
of current reporting approaches. Even the most mature reports of the panel show evidence 
that Integrated Reporting, and most presumably the underlying rationale of Integrated 
Thinking, are still ongoing processes.
Having said that, we believe that the existing documents already provide inspirational 
practices for all insurers willing to embark upon this exercise (see below).
CONCLUSION
Good practices
Success factors
Inspiring documents
Represent the business model using a simple 
diagram
Clarity and readability
Zurich Insurance Group, Annual 
Report 2014
Stakeholders’ roles in the value creation 
process
Clarity
AXA, Activity and Corporate 
responsibility Report 2014
Establish the connection between long-term 
industry trends and strategy
Consistency
Generali, Annual Integrated 
Report 2014
Aviva, Corporate responsibility 
report 2014
Clarify the links between strategy, material 
issues and key performance indicators
Clarity
Aegon, 2014 Integrated Review
Present the link between the capitals, the 
business model and value creation
Connectivity and holistic ap­
proach
Sanlam, Annual report 2014

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CONTACTS
For further information on this benchmark, please contact:
Jean-Claude Pauly
Partner, Global Head of Insurance
jean-claude.pauly@mazars.fr
 
Coralie Chanu
Manager, CSR & Sustainable Development
coralie.chanu@mazars.fr
 
Maël Gallène
Consultant, CSR & Sustainable Development
mael.gallene@mazars.fr