CNO and CNA open blinds on LTCI performance

One insurer with an active long-term care insurance unit and one with a large closed block of long-term care insurance business have given a little information about their operations in recent earnings reports.

CNO Financial Group, a Carmel, Indiana-based company that still writes long-term care insurance through its Bankers Life unit, says long-term care insurance sales fell to $5.2 million in the third quarter, from $6 million in the third quarter of 2015.

Long-term care insurance premium revenue fell to $116 million, from $122 million.

After adjusting for the effects of the low interest rate environment, the ratio of long-term care insurance benefits to revenue stood at 77.7 percent, down from 83.8 percent in the year-earlier quarter. 

Related: CNO increases long-term care insurance sales

CNO had tried to reinsure a block of its old long-term care insurance business. The closed-block reinsurance arrangement caught regulators’ attention when the reinsurance provider was caught up in an investigation of an investment services provider of its own. Recapturing the closed long-term care insurance block from the reinsurer led to a $53 million after-tax charge, CNO says.

The charge was about what CNO had expected it would be, the company says.

The company also contributed $200 million to its insurance subsidiaries to compensate for the effects of the recapture.