Athene Holding (NYSE:ATH) Ltd.’s ATH second-quarter 2021 adjusted operating income of $5.04 per share outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 48.2%. Moreover, the bottom line doubled year over year.
The company’s results benefited from increased gross organic inflows, higher premiums and higher net investment income.
Athene Holding Ltd. Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
Behind the Headlines
Operating revenues of $3.8 billion doubled year over year due to higher premiums, net investment income and product charges as well as other revenues.
Premiums of $1.6 billion increased more than four-fold year over year in the second quarter.
Net investment income was $2 billion in the quarter under review, up 52.5% year over year.
Net invested assets of $160.8 billion as on Jun 30, 2021 improved 17% year over year.
Gross organic inflows totaled $7.6 billion in the quarter under review, increasing 9% year over year. The results reflected the advantage of Athene's diversified funding channels, with particular strength on the institutional side of the business in funding agreements and pension risk transfer (PRT).
Total benefits and expenses of $4.4 billion increased 33.6% year over year in the quarter under review. The rise was primarily due to higher future policy and other policy benefits, and policy and other operating expenses.
Quarterly Segmental Update
Retirement Services reported adjusted operating income of $634 million, up threefold year over year. The increase was driven by strong growth in average net invested assets of $30 billion as well as above-average net investment earnings from alternative investments.
Corporate and Other generated adjusted operating income of $366 million, up 29.8% year over year. The upside was primarily attributable to higher alternative investment income, partially offset by higher preferred dividends and interest expense.
Financial Update
The company exited the second quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $8.1 billion, which improved 4.6% from 2020-end level. Total debt of $2.5 billion at the end of the quarter inched up 24.8% from the figure at 2020-end. Adjusted debt to capital ratio of 13.5 deteriorated 240 basis points (bps) year over year.
Adjusted book value per share was $67.46 as of Jun 30, 2021, up 31.9% year over year.
Athene exited the second quarter with excess equity capital of $4 billion and total deployable capital of $8.3 billion. Adjusted operating ROE of 30.8% expanded 1140 bps year over year.
Zacks Rank & Performance of Other Insurers
Athene currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Of the insurance industry players that have reported second-quarter results so far, earnings of Voya Financial (NYSE:VOYA), Inc. VOYA, MGIC Investment (NYSE:MTG) Corporation MTG and American Equity Investment Life (NYSE:AEL) Holding Company AEL beat the respective Zacks Consensus Estimate.
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