The Fed Looks at Life Insurers' Tonsils

The Federal Reserve Board looks in U.S. life insurers' throats every three months to see how they're doing. (Related: JPMorgan Worries About BBB Firm Falling Into Junk Category) The Fed probes life insurers' finances by compiling data from sources like S&P Global and the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Unlike many private organizations that publish reports on life and annuity issuers' performance, the Fed distinguishes between life insurers' own general account investments and the customer-controlled separate accounts inside products such as variable annuities. The Fed published the new performance data for the second quarter last week. The new release shows that life insurers had a total of $5.5 trillion in general account assets and about $4.8 trillion in general account liabilities compared with $5 trillion in general account assets and $4.5 trillion in general account liabilities a year earlier. Customers' separate account assets increased 1%, to about $2.7 trillion. To see how life insurers have been doing over the past five years, see the data cards in the slideshow above.

Resources

Links to documents related to the Financial Accounts of the United States are available here. — Read Life Insurers Are Hungry For Staffers: Jacobson, on ThinkAdvisor. — Connect with ThinkAdvisor Life/Health on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.