AXA Equitable Shares Debut on New York Stock Exchange

One reason for the muted investor response to the IPO may be that, under AXA, AXA Equitable has taken a low-key approach to publicity. Operating as a stand-alone company, with its own stock and its own quarterly earnings releases, could help AXA Equitable get more attention from investors and from members of the general public.

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Henry Hyde, the founder of the old Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States, was born in 1834. His high school teachers quit teaching, moved to New York to become life insurance agents, and persuaded him to leave school and join them, according to a 1901 biography available on the Google Books site.

Under Hyde's watch, Equitable became one of the biggest, best-known companies in the United States. The company built a headquarters building at 120 Broadway, in Manhattan, that was a short walk from the current New York Stock Exchange location. The original Equitable headquarters building was the tallest building in the United States. The building had one of the first passenger elevators in the United States. Hyde had to fight to get other building committee members to agree to install the elevator, according to the 1901 biography.

After the 1870 buiding burned down, the company built a second headquarters building at the same location.

AXA, a French company, acquired control of Equitable in 1991, and changed its name to AXA Equitable in 2004.

AXA Equitable now has about $12.5 billion in annual revenue, and 12,200 employees and advisors. It has large individual retirement, group retirement and insurance protection solutions unit, as well as large investment management unit.

— Read 3 AXA Equitable IPO Answers on ThinkAdvisor.

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