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High stock prices, and consumers' hunger for higher returns, are helping to push variable universal life (VUL) insurance sales much higher.
Annualized premiums from new individual VUL policy sales soared 17% between the fourth quarter of 2016 and the fourth quarter of 2017, according to new survey data from LIMRA.
The total amount of death benefits purchased increased 15%, and the number of policies purchased increased 8%.
VUL also did better than fixed universal life for all of 2017, although universal life sales beat VUL sales on some measures in some quarters. The number of VUL policies sold throughout the year increased 3% between 2016 and 2017, while the number of universal life policies sold fell 6%.
In 2016, universal life sales looked much healthier than VUL sales. The number of VUL policies sold fell 16%; the number of universal life policies sold fell just 6%.
