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Sale significantly reduces market and insurance risk
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Voya on track to complete $1 billion in share repurchases during
the first half of 2018, an additional $500 million in the second half
of the year
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Transaction shifts Voya’s focus to its higher-growth,
higher-return and capital-light businesses
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--
Voya Financial, Inc. (NYSE: VOYA) announced today that it has completed
the sale of its Voya Insurance and Annuity Company (“VIAC”) subsidiary
and divested substantially all of its variable, fixed and fixed indexed
annuities.
“With the completion of this transaction, we have significantly reduced
market and insurance risk for Voya and its shareholders,” said Rodney O.
Martin, Jr, chairman and chief executive officer, Voya Financial, Inc.
“Voya is now a simpler, more focused company that is well positioned for
accelerated growth. Our business mix remains diverse, but is now largely
focused on our higher-growth, higher-return, capital-light Retirement,
Investment Management and Employee Benefits businesses. We will continue
to invest in our businesses as we position Voya to best meet our
customers’ needs and achieve further profitable growth.
“We remain committed to increasing Voya’s adjusted operating earnings to
$1.30 to $1.40 per share within 12 months of closing the transaction. In
addition to benefiting from growth in our businesses, we also are
executing on $110 million to $130 million in expense savings over the
next 12 months.
“Voya also is building upon its track record as a good steward of
capital. As previously announced, we completed the repurchase of $500
million of our common stock earlier this year. With additional
repurchase agreements that we are executing in the second quarter, we
remain on track to complete the buyback of $1 billion of our shares
during the first half of 2018.
“As a result of our completing this transaction, we intend to deploy an
additional $500 million of excess capital toward share repurchases in
the second half of the year. In total, we expect to have repurchased
approximately $5 billion of our shares between our initial public
offering and the end of 2018,” added Martin.
VIAC has been acquired by Venerable Holdings, Inc. (“Venerable”), a
newly formed investment vehicle owned by a consortium of investors led
by Apollo Global Management, LLC (NYSE: APO), Crestview Partners and
Reverence Capital Partners. Concurrent with the sale of VIAC, Voya has
sold, via reinsurance, substantially all of its individual fixed and
fixed indexed annuity policies to Athene Holding, Ltd. (“Athene”) (NYSE:
ATH). Athene and Voya will also each have an equity stake in Venerable,
with Voya holding a 9.9% interest.
As part of the agreement, Voya Investment Management (IM) will serve as
the preferred asset management partner for Venerable. Voya IM will — for
a minimum of five years following the closing of the transaction —
manage general account assets of Venerable, currently representing
approximately $10 billion of assets under management (AUM). Voya IM also
will continue to manage the separate account funds associated with the
variable annuities, representing approximately $20 billion of AUM as of
March 31, 2018. This arrangement aligns with Voya IM’s focus on
providing long-term, risk-adjusted returns as well as its expertise in
serving the needs of insurance companies.
A modest amount of the variable annuities previously held in Voya’s
Closed Block Variable Annuity segment and not issued by VIAC are being
retained by Voya. The majority of the retained variable annuities do not
have living benefits.
“The completion of this transaction marks yet another important
milestone in our progress and achievements since becoming a standalone
company in 2013. With a commitment to generating further value for our
shareholders and delivering great solutions to our customers, we remain
well positioned to achieve our vision to be America’s Retirement
Company,” concluded Martin.
About Voya Financial
Voya Financial, Inc. (NYSE: VOYA), helps Americans plan, invest and
protect their savings - to get ready to retire better. Serving the
financial needs of approximately 14.7 million individual and
institutional customers in the United States, Voya is a Fortune 500
company that had $8.6 billion in revenue in 2017. The company had $541
billion in total assets under management and administration as of March
31, 2018. With a clear mission to make a secure financial future
possible - one person, one family, one institution at a time - Voya’s
vision is to be America’s Retirement Company®. Certified as a
“Great Place to Work” by the Great Place to Work® Institute,
Voya is equally committed to conducting business in a way that is
socially, environmentally, economically and ethically responsible. Voya
has been recognized as one of the 2018 World’s Most Ethical Companies®
by the Ethisphere Institute, one of the 2018 World’s Most Admired
Companies by Fortune magazine and one of the Top Green Companies
in the U.S. by Newsweek magazine. For more information, visit voya.com.
Follow Voya Financial on Facebook,
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and Twitter @Voya.
Forward-Looking and Other Cautionary Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements. Forward-looking
statements include statements relating to future developments in our
business or expectations for our future financial performance and any
statement not involving a historical fact. Forward-looking statements
use words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,”
“intend,” “plan,” and other words and terms of similar meaning in
connection with a discussion of future operating or financial
performance. Actual results, performance or events may differ materially
from those projected in any forward-looking statement due to, among
other things, (i) general economic conditions, particularly economic
conditions in our core markets, (ii) performance of financial markets,
including emerging markets, (iii) the frequency and severity of insured
loss events, (iv) mortality and morbidity levels, (v) persistency and
lapse levels, (vi) interest rates, (vii) currency exchange rates, (viii)
general competitive factors, (ix) changes in laws and regulations, such
as those relating to Federal taxation, state insurance regulations and
NAIC regulations and guidelines, including those affecting reserve
requirements for variable annuity policies and the use of and possible
application of NAIC accreditation standards to captive reinsurance
entities, those made pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and
Consumer Protection Act, and the U.S. Department of Labor’s final rules
and exemptions pertaining to the fiduciary status of providers of
investment advice, or any amendments thereto, (x) changes in the
policies of governments and/or regulatory authorities, and (xi) our
ability to successfully complete the transaction entered into on Dec.
20, 2017. Factors that may cause actual results to differ from those in
any forward-looking statement also include those described under “Risk
Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Results of
Operations and Financial Condition - Trends and Uncertainties” in our
Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended Dec. 31, 2017, which the
company filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Feb. 23,
2018 and in our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the three-month period
ended March 31, 2018, which the company filed with the Securities and
Exchange Commission on May 2, 2018.
VOYA-IR
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Source: Voya Financial, Inc.