Prudential Financial lost money in the third quarter, but U.S. sales of some products, including individual fixed annuities, increased.
Charles Lowrey, Prudential's chairman, noted in a comment on the results that the company cut costs by $750 million one year ahead of schedule.
The company continues to move toward becoming "a higher growth and less market-sensitive company," Lowrey said.
The Earnings
The third quarter ended Sept. 30.
Prudential is reporting a $284 million net loss for the quarter on $22 billion in revenue, compared with $1.5 billion in net income on $20 billion in revenue for the third quarter of 2020.
The Newark, New Jersey-based life insurer's after-tax adjusted operating income, which excludes the performance of the derivatives used to manage annuity risk and some other gains and charges, fell to $803 million, from $1.5 billion.
Prudential has large operations in Japan, and one challenge the company faced in the third quarter was a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations there.
Prudential executives will discuss the results during a conference call set to start at 11 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time Nov. 2.
Annuities
Prudential's quarterly financial supplement shows that overall U.S. individual annuity sales fell to $1.4 billion, from $1.5 billion in the year-earlier quarter.
Sales of the FlexGuard variable annuities that Prudential has emphasized fell to $1.1 billion, from $1.3 billion, but sales of fixed annuities climbed to $249 million, from $37 million.
Prudential breaks out annuity sales by distribution channel.
