RICHMOND, Va., July 31, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Genworth Financial, Inc. (NYSE: GNW) announced on July 29, 2014 that it is conducting a comprehensive review of its long term care insurance claim reserves. Many of the company's investors have asked for additional information about the last in-depth review of the claims reserve, which was conducted in 2012. The company cannot predict how the results of the current review will compare with the results of its review in 2012.
As a result of the 2012 claims review, the company established refinements to its claim reserves to reflect how a claim transitions by diagnosis and care facility, trends in benefit utilization, and refinements to claim terminations. The impact to GAAP claim reserves as a result of the new methodology was an increase to reserves of approximately $166 million as of September 30, 2012. Separately, the company also made changes to claim reserves to appropriately reflect waiver of premium benefit, shared policies where both lives are on claim, reinsurance on incurred but not reported claims, and the valuation interest rate. The impact to GAAP claim reserves as a result of these changes was a decrease to reserves of approximately $165 million as of September 30, 2012. The net impact to GAAP claim reserves as a result of the 2012 claims review was a net increase to reserves of approximately $1 million as of September 30, 2012.
The primary areas of focus in the current review are: (i) an analysis of potential causes of the meaningful increases in adverse claims experience in the second quarter of 2014 and (ii) an assessment of the assumptions and methodology underlying the associated reserves, including morbidity, mortality, interest rates and claim terminations. The company intends to complete this review before the release of financial results for the third quarter of 2014. The company continues to believe that the existing assumptions and methodology provide the most reliable best estimate. However, given the review underway that will consider both long-term and recent experience, the company will likely change some of its assumptions, which could increase our long term care insurance claim reserves, and any increase may or may not be material.
About Genworth Financial
Genworth Financial, Inc. (NYSE: GNW) is a leading Fortune 500 insurance holding company committed to helping families become more financially secure, self-reliant and prepared for the future. Genworth has leadership positions in long term care insurance and mortgage insurance and competitive offerings in life insurance and fixed annuities that assist consumers in solving their insurance, retirement and home ownership needs.
Genworth operates through three divisions: U.S. Life Insurance, which includes life insurance, long term care insurance and fixed annuities; Global Mortgage Insurance, containing U.S. Mortgage Insurance and International Mortgage Insurance segments; and the Corporate and Other division, which includes the International Protection and Runoff segments. Products and services are offered through financial intermediaries, advisors, independent distributors and sales specialists. Genworth, headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, traces its roots back to 1871 and became a public company in 2004. For more information, visit genworth.com. From time to time, Genworth releases important information via postings on its corporate website. Accordingly, investors and other interested parties are encouraged to enroll to receive automatic email alerts and Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds regarding new postings. Enrollment information is found under the "Investors" section of genworth.com. From time to time, Genworth's publicly traded subsidiaries, Genworth MI Canada Inc. and Genworth Mortgage Insurance Australia Limited, separately release financial and other information about their operations. This information can be found at http://www.genworth.com.au and http://genworth.ca.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains certain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements may be identified by words such as "expects," "intends," "anticipates," "plans," "believes," "seeks," "estimates," "will" or words of similar meaning and include, but are not limited to, statements regarding the outlook for the company's future business and financial performance. Forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and assumptions, which are subject to inherent uncertainties, risks and changes in circumstances that are difficult to predict. Actual outcomes and results may differ materially due to global political, economic, business, competitive, market, regulatory and other factors and risks, including, but not limited to, the following:
- Risks relating to the company's businesses, including downturns and volatility in global economies and equity and credit markets; downgrades or potential downgrades in the company's financial strength or credit ratings; interest rate fluctuations and levels; adverse capital and credit market conditions; the valuation of fixed maturity, equity and trading securities; defaults or other events impacting the value of the company's fixed maturity securities portfolio; defaults on the company's commercial mortgage loans or the mortgage loans underlying the company's investments in commercial mortgage-backed securities and volatility in performance; availability, affordability and adequacy of reinsurance; defaults by counterparties to reinsurance arrangements or derivative instruments; an adverse change in risk-based capital and other regulatory requirements; insufficiency of reserves and required increases to reserve liabilities; legal and regulatory constraints on dividend distributions by the company's subsidiaries; competition, including from government-owned and government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) offering mortgage insurance; loss of key distribution partners; regulatory restrictions on the company's operations and changes in applicable laws and regulations; legal or regulatory investigations or actions; the failure of or any compromise of the security of the company's computer systems and confidential information contained therein; the occurrence of natural or man-made disasters or a pandemic; the effect of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act; ineffective or inadequate risk management program; changes in accounting and reporting standards; goodwill impairments; impairments of or valuation allowances against the company's deferred tax assets; significant deviations from the company's assumptions in its insurance policies and annuity contracts; accelerated amortization of deferred acquisition costs and present value of future profits; ability to increase premiums on in force and future long term care insurance products, including any current rate actions and any future rate actions; the failure of demand for life insurance, long term care insurance and fixed annuity products to increase; medical advances, such as genetic research and diagnostic imaging, and related legislation; ability to continue to implement actions to mitigate the impact of statutory reserve requirements; political and economic instability or changes in government policies; fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates and international securities markets; the significant portion of the company's international mortgage insurance risk in force with high loan-to-value ratios; increases in U.S. mortgage insurance default rates; failure to meet, or have waived to the extent needed, the company's U.S. mortgage insurance subsidiaries' minimum statutory capital requirements and hazardous financial condition standards; the influence of Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) and a small number of large mortgage lenders and investors and changes to the role or structure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; failure to meet the revised GSE eligibility standards or the capital required to meet the revised standards may be higher than anticipated; ability to realize the benefits of the company's rescissions and curtailments; the extent to which loan modifications and other similar programs may provide benefits to the company; deterioration in economic conditions or a decline in home prices in the United States; problems associated with foreclosure process defects in the United States that may defer claim payments; decreases in the volume of high loan-to-value mortgage originations or increases in mortgage insurance cancellations in the United States; increases in the use of alternatives to private mortgage insurance in the United States and reductions by lenders in the level of coverage they select; the impact of the use of reinsurance with reinsurance companies affiliated with the company's U.S. mortgage lending customers; and potential liabilities in connection with the company's U.S. contract underwriting services;
- Other risks, including the risk that the anticipated benefits of the announced expense reduction are not realized and the company may lose key personnel related to actions like this as well as general uncertainty in the timing of the company's turnaround; the possibility that in certain circumstances the company will be obligated to make payments to General Electric Company (GE) under the tax matters agreement with GE even if the company's corresponding tax savings are never realized and payments could be accelerated in the event of certain changes in control; and provisions of the company's certificate of incorporation and bylaws and the tax matters agreement with GE may discourage takeover attempts and business combinations that stockholders might consider in their best interests; and
- Risks relating to the company's common stock, including the suspension of dividends and stock price fluctuations.
The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future developments or otherwise.
SOURCE Genworth Financial, Inc.