Adds car insurance turnaround in first paragraph, details in second and third, comment from CFO in sixth

By Marta Serafinko and Mireia Merino

July 24 (Reuters) - Spanish insurer Mapfre MAP.MC said on Thursday its net income rose 24% in the first half as its car insurance business soared after dragging the company down in the previous years.

The firm's net profit increased to 570 million euros ($669.29 million), the company said.

Car insurance contributed 89 million euros in profit, after a loss of 19 million euros in the same period a year ago.

As prices of new cars and auto parts rose faster than insurance premiums in 2022 and 2023, Mapfre's car insurance business plunged into the red.

After the company managed to turn around the business in the U.S. in 2024, it did the same in its other markets, mainly Spain and Portugal, where it booked a net profit worth 37 million euros in the first half compared with a 28 million euro loss in the same period a year earlier.

The company did it mainly by reducing costs.

"We've not had to pass through all the effects of inflation to our customers," Chief Financial Officer Jose Luis Jimenez said in a call with investors and analysts.

The two countries represented almost half of its overall net profit.

The company's life insurance contributed 130 million euros to its net profit, 24% less than a year ago.

Its reinsurance business brought a 149 million profit, even after the company booked an 84 million euro cost related to wildfires in California.

($1 = 0.8516 euros)

(Reporting by Marta Serafinko and Mireia Merino in Gdansk, editing by David Latona and Inti Landauro; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

((gdansk.newsroom@thomsonreuters.com; +48 58 769 66 00;))