05:27 PM EDT, 05/08/2024 (MT Newswires) -- Manulife Financial ( MFC ) edged up in after-hours New York trading after the company on Wednesday said its first quarter profit rose 16%, beating expectations.

The life insurer reported core earnings rose 16% to $1.75 billion, or $0.94 per core share, from $1.53 billion, or $0.73 per core share, last year. The results topped the consensus analyst estimate for core earnings of $0.91 per share, according to Capital IQ.

The increase reflects strong business growth across the insurance businesses and higher fee income in global wealth and asset management (WAM) benefitting from favorable market impacts and positive net flows. Core earnings increased 39% in Asia and 25% in Global WAM compared with Q1 2023. Updates to actuarial methods and assumptions in the second half of 2023 also contributed to core earnings growth, the company said.

Net income attributed to shareholders of $900 million, or $0.45 per share, was down from $1.4 billion, or $0.73 per share, last year. Net of the reinsurance transaction with Global Atlantic, net income attributed to shareholders was $1.6 billion, up $0.2 billion.

ROE excluding the GA Reinsurance transaction was 15.5%.

Manulife maintained its dividend at $0.40 per share, payable on June 19.

The company's shares were last seen up US$0.005 to US$24.47 after hours. They closed up C$0.33 to C$33.60 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.