NU Online News Service, Nov. 4, 2003, 12:47 p.m. EST – Nationwide Financial Services Inc., Columbus, Ohio, says recent increases in interest rates and steps taken to cope with low rates helped it improve its third-quarter results.
The company is reporting $126 million in net income for the latest quarter on $1 billion in revenue, up from a net loss of $141 million on $802 million in revenue for the third quarter of 2002.
The spreads between the rates that Nationwide has promised its customers and the rates it earns on its own investments fell to 1.62 percentage points for individual fixed annuities and fixed-rate options within individual variable annuities during the third quarter, down from 1.81 percentage points for the third quarter of 2002.
But the spread for individual fixed annuity products was up from a low of 1.55 percentage points in the second quarter of 2003, and the average interest spread for institutional products increased to 2.1 percentage points for the latest quarter, from 1.8 percentage points for the third quarter of 2002, Nationwide says.
