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CNO Financial's (CNO) Q4 Earnings Beat Estimates, Surge Y/Y

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CNO Financial Group, Inc.’s (CNO - Free Report) fourth-quarter 2019 adjusted earnings per share of 47 cents beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 43 cents by 9.3%. The bottom line also improved 30.6% year over year, mainly on the back of solid revenues.

In the quarter under review, CNO Financial’s total revenues surged 37.4% year over year to $1069 million owing to policyholder and other special-purpose portfolios, higher fee revenues and other income plus other net realized investment gains.

Quarterly Operational Update

Total collected premiums of $972.8 million slipped 1.5% from the prior-year quarter, mainly due to weak contribution from Bankers Life segment.
New annualized premiums for life and health products amounted to $97.6 million, up 8.9% from the year-ago period.

First-year collected premiums declined 6.1% from the year-earlier quarter.

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

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

CNO Financial Group, Inc. price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | CNO Financial Group, Inc. Quote

Quarterly Segment Update

Bankers Life


Total collected premiums of $711.1 million were down 2.9% year over year.
New annualized premiums for life and health products dipped 0.5% year over year.

Washington National

Total collected premiums of $181.2 million inched up 2.8% year over year.
New Annualized premiums from life and health products were $39.7 million, up 31.9% from the year-ago figure.

Colonial Penn

Total collected premiums were $77.3 million, up 2.8% year over year.
New annualized premiums from life and health products were $15.9 million, down 8.1% from the amount recorded in the comparable quarter last year.

Long-Term Care in Run-Off

Total collected premiums were $3.2 million, down 13.5% year over year.
The long-term care business was ceded under a 100% indemnity coinsurance agreement in the third quarter of 2018.

Financial Update

Unrestricted cash and cash equivalents held by CNO Financial’s holding company were $580 million as of Dec 31, 2019, down 2.4% from the level at 2018 end.

Debt-to-capital ratio was 17.5% as of Dec 31, 2019 compared with 21.4% at 2018 end.

Securities Repurchase and Divided Update

In the fourth quarter of 2019, the company returned $91 million in the form of share repurchases and dividend.

Full-Year Update

For 2019, net income came in at $409.4 million against a net loss of $315 million in 2018.

In 2019, the company returned $319 million to its shareholders in the form of share repurchases and dividends.

Zacks Rank and Performance of Other Insurers

CNO Financial carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Among other players from the insurance industry, which already reported fourth-quarter earnings, the bottom-line results of Brown & Brown, Inc. (BRO - Free Report) and RLI Corp. (RLI - Free Report) beat estimates while that of Principal Financial (PFG - Free Report) matched the same. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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