Lincoln National
NYSE: LNC
$41.35 ▲ +0.51  (+1.26%)
At close: Jul 24, 2026 · 3:59 PM UTC
Financial Ratios
Market Cap7.81 Bn
P/E4.79
P/S0.41
Div. Yield0.04
ROIC (Qtr)0.09
Total Debt (Qtr)6.37 Bn
Revenue Growth (1y) (Qtr)13.11
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About

Lincoln National Corporation is a holding company that operates multiple insurance and retirement businesses through subsidiary companies. The firm offers wealth accumulation wealth protection group protection and retirement income products and solutions. It is organized under the laws of Indiana and maintains its principal executive offices in Radnor Pennsylvania. Lincoln Financial is the marketing name for the corporation and its subsidiaries. Revenue is generated…

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Sector: Financial Services Industry: Insurance - Life CIK: 0000059558

Investment Thesis

▲ Bull case
  • Lincoln's strategic focus on fixed indexed annuities (FIAs) is generating substantial growth with FIA sales up over 90% year-over-year, driven by differentiated crediting strategies, broader distribution and enhanced digital capabilities, positioning this segment to become a major growth engine as the company pivots away from price-sensitive MYGA products, while retaining 100% of fixed annuity sales following the exit of the external flow reinsurance treaty ensures that new business directly contributes to account value growth and spread income, creating a compounding effect where higher fixed annuity balances fuel increased spread earnings over time, supported by 24% year-over-year growth in fixed annuity account balances net of reinsurance, and this shift toward higher-margin, less market-sensitive products aligns with the company's objective to build a more balanced and resilient annuity portfolio, with spread-based products now representing 31% of total annuity account balances up from 28% a year ago, indicating meaningful progress in diversifying the business mix toward capital-efficient, predictable earnings streams, and the continued investment in digital capabilities such as statement on demand and expanded distribution partnerships for FIA not only improve the customer experience but also unlock new avenues for growth in segments where Lincoln can compete beyond price, reinforcing its ability to capture share in attractive markets without sacrificing profitability or capital efficiency.
  • Life Insurance is demonstrating a powerful turnaround with first quarter operating earnings of $41 million, the strongest first quarter result in five years and a meaningful improvement from an operating loss of $16 million in the prior year quarter, driven by higher alternative investment returns and the continued benefit of captive consolidation, which represents an approximately $10 million year-over-year tailwind, while the deliberate shift in new business mix toward products with more predictable cash flows — such as IUL, accumulation VUL and executive benefits — is beginning to emerge in the in-force, with core Life and MoneyGuard sales up 20% year-over-year and IUL leading growth due to its integrated product design and simplified in-force experience resonating with advisers, and this strategic repositioning is expected to generate more stable cash flows and attractive risk-adjusted returns over time as the in-force grows in size, supported by the company's deep distribution relationships and optimized footprint aligned with product strategy, and although the earnings impact will take time to meaningfully flow through, the early evidence of progress in Life Insurance validates the multi-year transformation effort and suggests that this business is on a path to becoming a durable contributor to earnings and free cash flow, particularly as the company continues to leverage its captive structure and alternative investments to enhance returns while maintaining disciplined expense management and investment in digital capabilities to improve producer and client experience.
  • Group Protection is delivering record first quarter earnings with operating income up 11% year-over-year to $112 million and margin expansion to 8%, a 60 basis point improvement, driven by strong group life results where the loss ratio improved by more than 800 basis points to roughly 67%, reflecting favorable incidence and severity outcomes and the benefits of disciplined pricing actions that have supported a more durable earnings profile, and the company's targeted segment strategy is gaining traction, with local market premium increasing by more than 4% — its strongest year-over-year increase in nearly a decade — and supplemental health premium up 28% year-over-year, indicating that growth is increasingly concentrated in the highest-margin, fastest-growing segments where Lincoln has tailored products, capabilities and distribution, and the continued investment in modernizing the claims platform and expanding digital tools for brokers and employers is enhancing the customer experience, reinforcing persistency and helping attract new business, while the high percentage of sales from existing customers (74%) and the focus on expanding additional lines of coverage, particularly in supplemental health, demonstrate deepening relationships and cross-selling opportunities, positioning Group Protection to become an increasingly meaningful contributor to Lincoln's higher-quality earnings profile as the company prioritizes margin expansion over top-line growth and leverages its diversified footprint across local, regional and national markets to serve evolving customer needs with greater agility.
  • Retirement Plan Services is showing early but tangible proof of progress from its realignment, with first quarter operating income up 26% year-over-year to $43 million, driven by continued spread expansion — base spreads increased 13 basis points to 116 basis points — alongside the benefit of higher equity markets supporting average account balances, which grew approximately 10% year-over-year to $125 billion, and the company's deliberate focus on retaining only the business that meets targeted return thresholds, even when accepting elevated outflows, is beginning to pay off, as net outflows improved significantly from the prior year quarter to approximately $200 million, and the combination of disciplined pricing on retained business, meaningful spread expansion and operating leverage from a higher quality business mix is what positions Retirement Plan Services to deliver durable earnings growth over time, supported by the application of a proven playbook from other parts of the business, with three priorities — disciplined growth, service excellence and enhancing the value proposition — being advanced through technology modernization, digitally enabled tools and analytics to deepen engagement, and although the realignment is in its early stages, the early progress in earnings and spreads, combined with the expectation to sustain similar year-over-year growth, suggests that this business is on a trajectory to become a more stable and profitable contributor, particularly as the company continues to optimize its distribution model and update its value proposition by segment to better serve plan sponsors and participants.
  • Lincoln's capital position remains a significant source of strength, with holding company liquidity net of prefunding at $805 million, well above historical operating ranges and providing substantial financial flexibility to act on multiple fronts over the next few years, supported by the eighth consecutive quarter of ending above the 420% RBC ratio target buffer level and a leverage ratio improved to 25%, now at the long-term target, reflecting meaningful progress since the end of 2023, and this strong capital foundation, combined with growing dividend capacity from operating subsidiaries, provides the flexibility to support strategic capital priorities such as optimizing the legacy Life block, scaling institutional funding agreements and growing fixed annuity account value and spread earnings, while the company's high-quality, well-diversified investment portfolio — with 97% of investments rated investment grade and below investment-grade exposure at historic lows — continues to deliver solid results, including a strong alternative investments portfolio that delivered an annualized return of 12.3% in the quarter, above the 10% target, and the breadth and diversification of the portfolio give confidence in its ability to achieve return objectives over time, even amid elevated market volatility, and the continued focus on leveraging technology to improve productivity and ensuring the expense base is appropriately sized to support strategic objectives further enhances the company's ability to generate free cash flow and capital generation, which has been tracking in line with expectations and is increasingly being upstreamed to the holding company, reinforcing the financial flexibility to pursue growth opportunities and weather uncertainty.
▼ Bear case
  • Lincoln's Annuities business continues to face persistent headwinds from traditional variable annuity outflows, which remain a significant drag on earnings and account balances, with total net outflows of approximately $2.2 billion in the quarter — an increase from the prior year — driven largely by $2.6 billion in traditional variable annuity net outflows, and while the company notes that the outflow rate has remained relatively consistent over the past year, the increase in outflow volume reflects growth in underlying account balances from prior favorable equity markets, suggesting that as those balances mature and surrender charge periods expire, surrender activity is likely to remain elevated, creating a structural headwind to fee income and spread-based earnings, and although the company is shifting toward less market-sensitive products, the continued reliance on variable annuities for free cash flow generation exposes the business to market volatility and interest rate sensitivity, with the VA block representing an 80 basis point ROA business that requires similar annualized earnings growth to maintain its trajectory, a challenge when market tailwinds are absent, as seen in the first quarter when lower equity markets pressured VA earnings, and the company's own guidance suggests it is trending toward the low end of its 66 to 70 basis point ROA guide for the medium term, indicating limited near-term upside in annuity profitability despite spread income growth in fixed annuities and RILA.
  • Life Insurance's turnaround remains fragile and heavily dependent on non-recurring or transient benefits, with the year-over-year improvement in first quarter operating earnings driven largely by higher alternative investment returns and the continued benefit of captive consolidation, which represents an approximately $10 million year-over-year tailwind that will normalize after the second and third quarters of this year, and while the company cites favorable mortality experience and early evidence of the strategic repositioning toward products like IUL and accumulation VUL, the modest contribution from the new business mix shift to underlying earnings suggests that the earnings power of the transformed Life franchise is still nascent and highly uncertain, and the company's acknowledgment that alternative investment returns could experience variability due to elevated market volatility introduces further risk, as the Q2 FY25 also benefited from favorable mortality experience, which could create a less favorable year-over-year earnings comparison even as the underlying trajectory improves, and given that Life Insurance delivered an operating loss of $16 million in the prior year quarter, the current profitability is not yet self-sustaining and remains vulnerable to shifts in alternative returns, mortality trends or the non-recurring benefit of captive consolidation, raising doubts about the durability of the earnings recovery.
  • Group Protection's margin expansion, while positive, may be overstated due to the normalization of disability results from historically low levels, with the disability loss ratio increasing to 73.4% from 70.1% in the prior year quarter, driven by two primary factors: elevated incidence rates from the introduction of two newly effective paid family leave (PFML) states — an expected but near-term headwind that is anticipated to moderate through the year — and unfavorable resolution severity in long-term disability (LTD), which reflects the ongoing normalization from record low levels experienced over the last two years, and although the company notes that incidence remains favorable relative to longer-term expectations, the continued normalization in claims resolution severity suggests that the favorable dynamics that supported strong disability results in recent years are fading, and as the mix of the block evolves with a greater percentage of reserves from more recent years where new claim severities have been favorable, the release of reserves from older high-severity claims becomes less impactful, meaning that the tailwind from favorable reserve releases is diminishing, and while the company expects the historical seasonal pattern of risk results improving from the first to second quarter to repeat, the Q2 FY25 included approximately $15 million associated with an annual experience refund tied to one state's PFML program, which has now been accrued quarterly, mitigating one-time impacts but not altering the underlying trend of normalization, and this suggests that the margin expansion in Group Protection may be partially driven by transient factors rather than sustainable pricing power or underwriting excellence.
  • Retirement Plan Services' improved earnings are heavily reliant on favorable equity markets and spread expansion that may not be sustainable, with the year-over-year growth in operating income driven by continued spread expansion — base spreads up 13 basis points to 116 basis points — and the benefit of higher equity markets supporting average account balances, which grew approximately 10% year-over-year to $125 billion, and while the company highlights disciplined pricing on retained business and operating leverage from a higher quality business mix, its outlook for the second quarter anticipates net outflows to be elevated in the range of $2 billion to $2.5 billion, driven by a small number of known plan terminations that did not meet profitability targets, indicating that the business is still carrying unprofitable liabilities that are being shed at the cost of elevated outflows, and this deliberate rejection of unprofitable business, while sound in the long term, creates near-term volatility in net flows and account balances, and the company's own admission that the realignment is in its early stages, combined with the expectation that net outflows will remain elevated due to known plan terminations, suggests that the earnings improvement may be more reflective of market-driven account balance growth and spread capture on new money than fundamental operating leverage, and if equity markets weaken or spread expansion slows, the business could quickly lose its earnings momentum, particularly given that the improvement in base spreads is partly driven by deploying new money at rates above the existing portfolio yield, a tactic that may not be repeatable indefinitely as the portfolio reprices.
  • Lincoln's holding company liquidity, while appearing strong at $805 million net of prefunding, may overstate true financial flexibility, as the increase in holding company cash is partly driven by the growing dividend capacity from operating subsidiaries, which itself depends on the sustained profitability and capital generation of those businesses, and if the headwinds in Annuities from variable annuity outflows, the fragility of the Life Insurance turnaround, the normalization in Group Protection disability results or the market-dependent nature of Retirement Plan Services' spread expansion were to persist or worsen, the upstreaming of free cash flow to the holding company could slow or reverse, reducing the liquidity buffer, and although the company cites the continued build in holding company liquidity as reflecting growing dividend capacity, this capacity is not guaranteed and is contingent on the execution of its strategic priorities across all four businesses, any of which could face setbacks, and the company's reliance on alternative investments to boost returns — while diversified — introduces variability that could affect the consistency of earnings and capital generation, particularly in Life Insurance where alternative returns contributed significantly to the quarter's improvement, and this creates a risk that the perceived financial flexibility may be more illusory than real, especially if operating subsidiaries fail to deliver consistent, durable earnings power as expected.

Segments Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Consolidation Items Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Peer Comparison

Companies in the Insurance - Life
S.No. Ticker Company Market CapP/EP/STotal Debt (Qtr)
1 PUK Prudential Plc 75.05 Bn13.616.534.46 Bn
2 AFL Aflac Inc 63.80 Bn13.763.85-
3 MET Metlife Inc 60.34 Bn17.570.850.70 Bn
4 MFC Manulife Financial Corp 52.65 Bn16.01-4.69 Bn
5 UNM Unum Group 14.19 Bn18.641.243.76 Bn
6 PRI Primerica, Inc. 9.76 Bn51.355.470.60 Bn
7 JXN Jackson Financial Inc. 8.17 Bn-19.440.752.08 Bn
8 LNC Lincoln National Corp 7.81 Bn4.790.416.37 Bn