CNO Financial (CNO) Beats Q2 Earnings & Revenue Estimates

CNO Financial Group, Inc.’s (NYSE:CNO) second-quarter 2017 net operating earnings of 45 cents per share surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 21.6%. The bottom line also improved 28.6% year over year on higher revenues.

CNO Financial’s total revenue increased 5.2% year over year to $1.1 billion. The top line also beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 5.8%.

Total collected premiums were $925.0 million, up 7% from the prior-year quarter. New annualized premiums for life and health products amounted to $81.9 million, down 9% from the year-ago quarter. First-year collected premiums totaled $352.3 million, up 16% from the last year quarter.

Quarterly Segment Update

Bankers Life

Total collected premiums were $680.6 million, up 8% year over year. This was primarily due to an increase in premiums from annuity products.

New annualized premiums decreased 13% year over year to $40.2 million due to lower sales of life products.

Pre-tax operating earnings grew 21% over the last-year quarter. The upside reflected higher spread income on annuities due to growth in the block and favorable margins on the long-term care block. It also reflected $5.9 million of higher income from call premiums and prepayments compared to the previous-year quarter.

WashingtonNational

Total collected premiums were $167.5 million, up 4% year over year. This was primarily due to higher sales of supplemental health products.

New Annualized premiums from life and health products were $25.6 million, up 5.8% from the last-year quarter.

Pre-tax operating earnings were up 10% year over year due to higher margins on the supplemental health block.

Colonial Penn

Total collected premiums were $72.5 million, up 4% year over year.

New annualized premiums were $16.1 million, down 16% from the year-ago quarter. Lower lead volume, primarily due to reduced marketing expenses, resulted in the deterioration.

The pre-tax operating earnings were $8.0 million, up 166% year over year principally due to favorable mortality and reduced marketing expenses.

Long-Term Care

The long-term care business was recaptured in Sep 2016. This segment recognized pre-tax earnings of $1.7 million in the second quarter.

Corporate Operations

The segment includes performance of the investment advisory subsidiary and corporate expenses.

Pre-tax loss was $13.2 million, wider than a loss of $7 million in the year-ago quarter. This was primarily due to higher expenses, partially offset by favorable investment returns.

CNO Financial Group, Inc. Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

CNO Financial Group, Inc. Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise | CNO Financial Group, Inc. Quote

Financial Update

Unrestricted cash and investments held by CNO Financial’s holding company were $278 million at Jun 30, 2017, up 5.3% from year-end 2016.

Book value per common share increased to $28.28 from $25.28 year over year. Book value per diluted share, excluding accumulated other comprehensive income, increased to $22.74 from $20.67 as of Jun 30, 2016.

Consolidated risk-based capital ratio was 458% as of Jun 30, 2017. This reflects estimated statutory operating earnings of $166 million and insurance company dividends to the holding company of $177 million during the first six months of 2017.

Securities Repurchase and Divided Update

During the quarter, the company repurchased $68.9 million of common stock. During the first six months of 2017, it bought back 5.4 million common shares at a total cost of $111.9 million.

As of Jun 30, 2017, CNO Financial had 169.0 million shares outstanding and had authority to repurchase up to an additional $440.8 million of the common stock.

During the second quarter, dividends paid on common stock totaled $15.3 million.

Zacks Rank and Performance of Other Multiline Insurers

CNO Financial currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here

Among other players in the same space that have reported their second-quarter earnings so far, the bottom lines of The Progressive Corporation (NYSE:PGR) and The Travelers Companies, Inc. (NYSE:TRV) missed their respective Zacks Consensus Estimate while RLI Corp. (NYSE:RLI) beat the same.

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