China's insurers posted strong growth of premium income from January to April due to a rebounding economy, the China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC) said in Beijing Thursday.

For the first four months, premium income of the whole insurance industry topped 565.5 billion yuan (US$82.8 billion), up 36.58 percent from a year earlier, said CRIC.

Profits of insurers in the country surged 158 percent to 27.75 billion yuan from January to April, according to CIRC.

Market share of foreign insurance companies rose slightly to 4.07 percent in the January-April period with a premium income of 23.04 billion yuan, it said.

Insurance funds, which include insurance companies' bank deposits, bonds and securities investments, totaled 3.97 trillion yuan in the first four months with a yield of 1.52 percent.

(Xinhua News Agency May 21, 2010)