Deseret Management Corp. has decided to get out of the life insurance and annuity business.
Beneficial Life Insurance Company, a 104-year-old unit of Deseret, Salt Lake City, will stop taking applications for new life and annuity products Aug. 31.
Deseret, a commercial offshoot of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, founded Beneficial in response to the belief of Heber Grant, the seventh president of the church, that the church community had a responsibility to protect its widows and orphans, Beneficial President Kent Cannon writes in a letter to policyholders.
“At the time of our founding we fulfilled a need that was not being met in the Intermountain West,” Cannon writes. “Since that time, global and national competitors have entered the marketplace with a much broader range of products…. Beneficial’s relatively small size puts the company at a competitive disadvantage.”