Phoenix Reports Smaller 4th Quarter Net Loss

By Staff Writer

February 07, 2002 at 07:00 PM

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NU Online News Service, Feb. 7, 2:24 p.m. – The Phoenix Companies Inc., Hartford, is reporting a $7.5 million net loss for the fourth quarter of 2001 on $626 million in revenue, compared with a $144 million net loss on $687 million in revenue for the fourth quarter of 2000.

Phoenix sells life insurance and annuities and investment management services, and it also supplies venture capital.

Net results for the latest quarter include a variety of taxes and charges, as well as $35 million in losses on investments. In addition to suffering losses on investments linked to Argentina and several troubled companies, Phoenix says it had problems with several collateralized debt obligations.

Excluding the investment losses, the taxes and the charges, the company would have reported a loss of $11 million, compared with a loss of $228 million for the fourth quarter of 2000, according to a table on page 20 of a statistical supplement to the company's earnings release.

The life and annuity unit generated $25 million in operating income for the latest quarter, up from a net loss of $21 million for the comparable quarter in 2000, and the venture capital unit increased its operating earnings to $16 million, from $9 million. Income at the investment management unit fell to $13 million, from $14 million.

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