Yahoo Finance CNO Financial Group, Inc. (NYSE:CNO) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript
CNO Financial Group, Inc. (NYSE:CNO) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript April 30, 2024
CNO Financial Group, Inc. isn’t one of the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds at the end of the third quarter (see the details here).
Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the CNO Financial Group First Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. All lines have been placed on mute during the presentation portion of the call with an opportunity for question-and-answer at the end. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand this conference call over to our host Adam Auvil, please.
Adam Auvil: Good morning, and thank you for joining us on CNO Financial Group's first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. Today's presentation will include remarks from Gary Bhojwani, Chief Executive Officer; and Paul McDonough, Chief Financial Officer. Following the presentation, we will also have other business leaders available for the question-and-answer period. During this conference call, we will be referring to information contained in yesterday's press release. You can obtain the release by visiting the Media section of our website at cnoinc.com. This morning's presentation is also available in the Investors section of our website and was filed in a Form 8-K yesterday. We expect to file our Form 10-Q and post it on our website on or before May 6.
Let me remind you that any forward-looking statements we make today are subject to a number of factors, which may cause actual results to be materially different than those contemplated by the forward-looking statements. Today's presentation contains a number of non-GAAP measures, which should not be considered as substitutes for the most directly comparable GAAP measures. You'll find a reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures to the corresponding GAAP measures in the appendix. Throughout the presentation, we will be making performance comparisons, and unless otherwise specified, any comparisons made will refer to changes between first quarter 2024 and first quarter 2023. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Gary.
Gary Bhojwani: Thanks, Adam. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. CNO delivered another strong quarter of operating performance, building on our 2023 momentum and track record of sustainable growth. Our first quarter results were among the best operating metrics we've generated in the past several years with respect to consumer and worksite sales, our distribution force and new products. Our consumer and worksite businesses posted our seventh consecutive quarter of sales production growth and our fifth consecutive quarter in producing agent counts. Total new annualized premium was up 8%, benefiting from successful distribution force metrics in both divisions. Our dedicated teams delivered sales growth in nearly all product categories.
We posted solid and sustainable earnings with operating earnings per share of $0.52. Results benefited from favorable insurance product margin, reflecting growth in the business and continued expansion of the portfolio book yield, which continues to benefit from higher interest rates. The new money rate exceeded 6% for a fifth consecutive quarter. The only material item that offset our strong operating results in the quarter was $24.3 million of unfavorable mark-to-market pretax impacts on real estate partnerships with our alternative – within our alternative investments. Despite these impacts, total net investment income was up in the quarter. Capital and liquidity remain well above target levels after returning $57 million to shareholders.
See also
25 States with Highest Mortgage Delinquency Rates and
10 Leisure and Recreation Services Stocks to Buy.
To continue reading the Q&A session, please click here.
