Allianz sticks to full-year goals, despite third quarter profit drop

German insurer Allianz, Europe's biggest, said Friday it is sticking to its full-year earnings targets, despite a drop in profits in the third quarter.

"In a volatile financial market environment, Allianz's fundamentals remained at a solid level in all business segments in the third quarter," said chief financial officer Dieter Wemmer.

"We expect the full-year operating profit to grow and arrive in the upper end of our target range of 10.0 to 10.8 billion euros," ($10.9-11.7 billion), Wemmer said.

In the period from July to September, operating profit declined by 7.5 percent to 2.452 billion euros.

Bottom-line net profit was down 15.4 percent at 1.359 billion euros, lower than analysts expectations.

Allianz blamed the decline on the fact that the year-earlier figure had been boosted by one-off tax benefits.

Third-quarter revenues declined by 4.5 percent to 27.5 billion euros.

Like other banking and insurance groups, Allianz is feeling the squeeze from the current environment of low interest rates in the eurozone, as well as the volatility on the financial markets.