Genworth Financial Inc

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Genworth Financial's second quarter 2026 earnings conference call. My name is Cynthia, and I will be your coordinator today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. We will facilitate a question and answer session towards the end of this conference call. As a reminder, the conference is being recorded for replay purposes. I would now like to turn the presentation over to Christine Jewell, head of investor relations. Please proceed.

Thank you and good morning. Welcome to Genworth's second quarter 2026 earnings call. The slide presentation that accompanies this call is available on the investor relations section of the Genworth website, investor.genworth.com. Our earnings release and financial supplement can also be found there and we encourage you to review these materials. Speaking today will be Jerome Upton, Interim President and Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer. Following our prepared remarks, we will open the call for questions. In addition to Jerome, Jamala Arland, President and CEO of our Closed Block Insurance Business, Greg Karawan, General Counsel, Kelly Saltzgaber, Chief Investment Officer, Samir Shah, CEO of CareScout, and Angela Simmons, CFO of our Closed Block Insurance Business, will also be available to take your questions. Together, the leadership team on today's call brings deep institutional knowledge with an average tenure at Genworth of nearly 20 years. During this morning's call, we may make various forward-looking statements. Our actual results may differ materially from such statements. We advise you to read the cautionary notes regarding forward-looking statements in our earnings release and related presentation, as well as the risk factors of our most recent annual report on Form 10-K as filed with the SEC. Today's discussion also includes non-GAAP financial measures that we believe may be meaningful to investors. In our investor materials, non-GAAP measures have been reconciled to GAAP where required in accordance with SEC rules. Additionally, reference to statutory results are estimates due to the timing of the statutory filings. And now I'll turn the call over to Jerome.

Thank you, Christine. And good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to join our second quarter earnings call. Before turning to our results, I want to acknowledge Tom's leave of absence for medical reasons, which we announced last month. On behalf of the board and our leadership team, we continue to wish Tom well and appreciate the support that has been shown over the last several weeks. We understand that you may have additional questions, but we ask that you withhold them for now. We will share any material developments, including any timelines, as and when appropriate. I have been serving as Interim President and CEO since that announcement, while continuing in my role as Chief Financial Officer. Genworth has a deep and experienced leadership team that has been actively engaged with Tom and our Board in the development of our strategy. The board remains confident in our strategic direction and the ability of our leadership team to execute against our objectives. I am grateful for the support of our board and leadership team as well as all of our colleagues in Genworth as we focus on advancing our existing strategy and delivering for our policyholders and shareholders. I will now share a brief overview of our second quarter results. Enact once again generated strong shareholder value. We advanced our long-term growth strategy through CareScout and we further strengthened the self-sustainability of our closed block. Genworth reported net income of $47 million or $0.12 per share with adjusted operating income excluding the closed block of $112 million or $0.29 per share. Our results this quarter were led by continued strong performance from Enact with adjusted operating income of $143 million. Turning to slide five, I will highlight our progress against each of Genworth's three strategic priorities during the second quarter. First, we continue to create shareholder value through ENAC's growing book value and capital returns. Our approximate 81% ownership stake in ENAC remains a key source of cash flows to Genworth and helps fuel our disciplined approach to capital allocation. Our balanced capital allocation strategy includes returning capital to shareholders through share repurchases while also investing in our long-term growth opportunities through CareScout. This approach enables us to drive near-term shareholder value while still positioning the company for sustainable long-term growth. During the second quarter, we received $103 million in capital returns from an act. Supported by these strong cash flows, we continued to execute on our share repurchase program. Since the initial authorization of our buyback program in May of 2022, we have bought back approximately $922 million worth of shares at an average price of $6.48 per share through July 31st. We believe these repurchases have created meaningful long-term value for shareholders while allowing us to continue investing in CareScout, which brings me to our next strategic priority. Turning to slide six, we continue to drive growth through CareScout, which represents a significant long-term opportunity given the growing demand for aging care, including from 70 million baby boomers now age 62 to 80. We are building a comprehensive aging care platform designed to help people understand, find, and fund the quality long-term care they need. We will do this in three ways. First, by providing access to a suite of integrated solutions across the aging journey. Second, through expert guidance informed by our data and decades of claims experience. And third, technology-enabled human connection delivering that expertise through trained advisors who provide personalized local support and helping families navigate what is often a complex, fragmented, and emotional process. We are integrating these capabilities across the platform to deliver a seamless experience and build a scalable business for long-term growth. Beginning with CareScout services on slide seven, we continue to expand the CareScout network at an impressive pace. In the first quarter, we added our first senior living communities to the network, marking an important step in broadening access beyond home care and expanding options available to consumers in the marketplace. As of the end of the second quarter, the network now includes more than 1,100 home care locations, and we continue to integrate senior living communities, targeting at least 2,000 in the network by the end of this year. Across major markets, the network now includes local advisors, aging care experts who help guide families in their search for high quality senior living communities. Once engaged, they provide personalized guidance, helping families navigate what can be a complex and important decision. So far this year, we've doubled the number of local advisors with representation in 26 states as of the end of the quarter. Together with our nationwide network of nurses, these local advisors provide families with access to both expert guidance and clinical expertise. As a reminder, our revenue model for senior living communities differs from our home care model with CareScout earning a one-time placement fee upon a successful move-in consistent with how the broader industry operates. This complements our existing home care preferred pricing model and contributes to a more diversified and scalable stream of revenue. We facilitated approximately 1,450 matches between care seekers and providers in the second quarter, bringing total matches for the first half of the year to approximately 2,950, over double the number of matches achieved in the first half of 2025. Beyond the end of the quarter, matches have been strong and well ahead of matches in the prior year. We've also made strong progress expanding CareScout's match footprint beyond our existing policyholder base, bolstered by senior living matches. As the network continues to scale and brand awareness grows, we expect to drive increased traction across the platform. We also expect a higher share of Genworth policyholders to utilize network providers and benefit from more efficient care coordination by our team, helping to stretch their benefit dollars further while also generating claims savings for our closed block over time. We are continuing to expand our offerings to employers and select affinity groups. This represents an opportunity to introduce more consumers to the Care Scout brand broaden access to our services, and generate additional fee-based revenues over time. Turning to CareScout Insurance on slide eight, we are pleased with the progress we have made toward launching our Care Assurance Worksite product, a version of our inaugural standalone long-term care product that will be available through employers. The Worksite product is approved and ready for a third quarter launch in at least 34 states. expanding care assurance into an important new distribution channel. We also continue to make progress seeking approvals in additional states. The worksite insurance offering combines long-term care, cost protection with immediate access to CareScout's ecosystem of aging care, helping policyholders and their families confidently navigate care needs through care planning, care navigation, caregiver support, and the CareScout Quality Network. This combination is differentiated in the marketplace as it helps customers prepare for their own future care needs while providing immediate resources that can support parents or other family members navigating care decisions today. As with our standalone care assurance product, the worksite offering is priced and structured for the long term. We remain focused on disciplined growth, appropriate risk management, and delivering a strong customer value proposition while driving returns for our shareholders. Our third strategic priority is actively managing our self-sustaining, customer-centric, closed block of LTC, LIFE and annuity products. This business is being managed with a focus on ensuring long-term sustainability, maintaining capital discipline and delivering supportive policyholder experiences. Our Multi-Year Rate Action Plan, or MIRAP, remains our most effective lever for maintaining that sustainability. In the second quarter, we secured $46 million of gross incremental premium approvals compared with $41 million in the prior year. We also received an additional $27 million of approvals in July. We continue to work with regulators to finalize pending rate increase requests, but the timing of approvals can be difficult to predict. We expect full-year 2026 premium approvals and benefit reductions to be broadly in line with 2025 levels, contributing approximately $1 billion of value on a net present value basis. As we enter the later stages of MIRAP, we expect the relative impact of benefit reductions to increase, while the relative impact of premium increases declines. This reflects the shrinking runway of future premium from Genworth policyholders as the closed block ages. We remain focused on executing this program with discipline to ensure the long-term self-sustainability of the closed block. I'd now like to walk through our second quarter financial results in further detail, beginning on slide nine. Adjusted operating income excluding the closed block was 112 million, driven by strong performance in an act, partially offset by a loss in corporate and other. As a reminder, Results of our closed block segment are reported separately in our disclosures. An Act delivered another strong quarter of performance with adjusted operating income of $143 million to Genworth. Results included a pre-tax reserve release of $37 million reflective of continued strong cure performance and loss mitigation activities. Results are up versus the prior quarter from seasonally lower losses and the prior year reflecting higher net investment income partially offset by the lower reserve release. In corporate and other, we reported an adjusted operating loss of $31 million for the quarter reflecting debt service cost and a growing Care Scout business. Our closed block segment reported an adjusted operating loss of $110 million. This was driven by liability remeasurement loss related to the actual variances from expected experience or A to E of 127 million pre-tax, primarily in LTC. Our A to E loss experience in the first half of 2026 has trended above the level implied by our full year expectation of approximately 300 million. While results can vary quarter to quarter, if these trends continue, the full year A to E losses could be higher than that level. As a reminder, These gap fluctuations do not impact our cash flows, economic value, or how we manage the business. Now, taking a closer look at Enact's performance beginning on slide 10. New insurance written of $15 billion in the quarter was seasonally higher than the prior quarter and increased versus the prior year as a result of a larger estimated market size. Primary insurance in force increased 2% year-over-year to $274 billion, supported by new insurance written and continued elevated persistency. Earned premiums were $245 million in the quarter, up versus the prior quarter, and in line with the prior year. As shown on slide 11, ENAC's favorable $37 million pre-tax reserve release drove a loss ratio of 14%. ENAC's estimated PMIR sufficiency ratio remained strong at 161%, or approximately $1.9 billion above requirements. Genworth's share of an Act's book value, including AOCI, was $4.4 billion at the end of the second quarter compared to $4.3 billion at the end of the first quarter. An Act has continued to deliver significant capital returns to Genworth. As I noted earlier, an Act returned $103 million of capital to Genworth during the quarter. An Act's strong balance sheet Discipline Underwriting, and Financial Flexibility position it to navigate a dynamic macroeconomic environment and continue creating shareholder value. Turning to our closed block on slide 12, we continue to proactively manage and reduce LTC risk through prudent in-force management, including benefit reductions and premium rate increases. As of the end of the second quarter, We had achieved, in aggregate, approximately $34.8 billion of benefit reductions and premium increases on a net present value basis since 2012. As part of our MIRAP, we offer a suite of options to help policyholders manage premium increases while maintaining meaningful coverage. These benefit solutions enable us to reduce our exposure to certain higher cost features, such as 5% compound benefit inflation options and large benefit pools. Cumulatively, about 62% of policyholders offered a benefit reduction have elected to take one, lowering our long-term risk. These initiatives have helped reduce our exposure to the riskiest LTC policy features. Notably, our exposure to the 5% compound benefit inflation option has decreased to approximately 35%, down from 57% in 2014 and the percentage of our policies with lifetime benefits has decreased to 11% from 24% in 2014. We remain committed to managing the closed block as a closed system, leveraging existing reserves and capital to cover future claims. We will not inject capital into these companies and given the long tail nature of our LTC insurance policies with peak claim years still over a decade away, we also do not expect capital returns. Turning to slide 13, our investment portfolio remains resilient and is conservatively positioned. The majority of our assets are in investment-grade fixed maturities held to support our long-duration liabilities. New money yields continue to exceed those on sales and maturities, with cash in our life insurance companies being invested at yields of approximately 6.2% per quarter. Our Alternative Assets program is largely comprised of diversified private equity investments and has targeted returns of approximately 12%, although fluctuations from quarter to quarter are expected. In the second quarter, realizations rebounded from a slow start to the year and helped drive higher investment income. We remain committed to growing our Alternative Assets portfolio within regulatory limitations due to its robust track record of returns diversification benefits, and natural fit with long-term liabilities. Next, turning to the holding company on slide 14. We ended the quarter with $215 million in cash and liquid assets. When evaluating holding company liquidity for capital allocation purposes and calculating the buffer to our debt service target, We excluded approximately $81 million of cash held for future obligations at the end of the quarter, including advanced cash payments from our subsidiaries. Our liquidity remains supported by recurring capital returns from an Act and our disciplined approach to capital deployment. Moving to capital allocation on slide 15, our priorities remain unchanged. We will continue to invest in long-term growth through CareScout. returned cash to shareholders through our share repurchase program when our share price trades below intrinsic value and opportunistically retired debt. During the quarter, we repurchased $62 million of shares at an average price of $8.74 per share and an additional $4 million in July. We also retired 10 million of principal debt in the quarter at a discount, bringing our holding company debt to 768 million. We maintain a disciplined capital structure with a cash interest coverage ratio on debt service of approximately nine times. I will now turn to our outlook for 2026 and provide an update on the guidance we previously shared. On its earnings call this morning, and NAC shared that it now expects to return approximately $550 to $600 million of capital to its shareholders in 2026. Based on our approximate 81% ownership position, we now expect to receive between $445 and $485 million from NAC for the full year. Second, we continue to create value for shareholders through our share repurchase program. For the full year 2026, We now expect to allocate between $225 and $250 million to share repurchases. As we have said before, this range may vary based on market conditions, business performance, holding company cash, and our share price. Third, turning to CareScout services. We remain focused on growing matches toward our previously discussed 2026 target of approximately $7,500 compared with 3,255 in 2025. We continue to make good progress and expect continued growth as we expand the CareScout network, integrate additional senior living communities, and increase consumer engagement. However, current match volumes are pacing below the level that would be required to reach the full year target. CareScout Services generated 6 million of revenue in the second quarter and a total of 12 million during the first half of the year. We continue to expect revenue in this business of 25 million for the full year. We also continue to expect investment of approximately 50 to 55 million in CareScout Services during 2026. These investments will support the continued expansion of our technology platform, the addition of new products, and growth across consumer and B2B channels. We are also deepening carrier partnerships and enhancing operational infrastructure to support higher volumes, recurring revenue and long-term scalability. For CareScout Insurance, we currently do not anticipate any additional capital investment in 2026 following our initial $85 million investment made in 2025 to support the launch of the business. We have made good progress overall with CareScout and remain confident in its continued growth in 2026. As we have noted previously, scaling these businesses and achieving break-even will take time. I will now provide an update on the ACSA litigation. The appeal hearing occurred in July. We continue to expect the Court of Appeal to reach a decision within approximately three to six months following the hearing. If the judgment is ultimately upheld and all appeals are favorably resolved, we expect to recover a total sum of approximately $750 million, subject to exchange rates at that time. We do not expect to pay taxes on this recovery. As we previously said, recoveries are not factored into our current capital allocation plans. If proceeds are received, we will deploy them in line with our existing priorities, investing in CareScout, Returning capital to shareholders and reducing debt. In closing, we are pleased with the progress we made against our priorities and with our financial performance in the second quarter. And that continues to deliver strong performance and capital returns. CareScout is expanding its network, products and distribution capabilities as we build a comprehensive aging care platform. At the same time, we continue to actively manage our closed block and maintain our disciplined and balanced approach to capital allocation. Our focus remains on driving long-term shareholder value through ENACT and CareScout, returning capital to shareholders, maintaining financial flexibility, and proactively managing our liabilities and risk. I also want to recognize our leadership team and colleagues for their continued focus and execution over the past several weeks. Their commitment to our policyholders, customers, and shareholders gives me confidence in our ability to execute against our priorities. Now, let's open up the line for questions.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the Q&A portion of the call. As a reminder, please refrain from using cell phones, speaker phones, or headsets. Press star one to ask a question. If at any time your question has already been answered or you would like to withdraw your question, please press star two to be removed from the queue. Please press star one now. We will pause for just a moment to assemble the queue. We will take our first question from Ryan Krueger with KBW.

Hey, thanks. Good morning. First, I wanted to extend our best wishes to Tom. For, in terms of our question, I guess, on the access Santander hearing, can you give us any, are you able to provide any color on your takeaway and view of how the hearing went in July as it's a bit difficult, admittedly, to follow it from here sometimes?

So, Ryan, first of all, this is Jerome, and thank you for your sentiments expressed to Tom. I am going to ask Greg Karawan, who's here with me, to answer your question around AXA and the July appellate court process.

Thanks, Jerome, and thanks for your question, Ryan. The only color commentary I can give you is that I think AXA's lawyers did an excellent job, but having been in this business for almost 40 years, I know one thing for certain, and that's litigation is inherently uncertain. We're not going to speculate on the outcome, but we were pleased with the way the hearing went.

Thanks. And follow up just on the potential use of proceeds if successful. I know you mentioned the same priorities you've been executing on, but would you see any or need or desire to accelerate the amount of either debt reduction or investment into CareScout or should we expect those to continue along a similar path regardless and then most of the incremental proceeds, if successful, could be used more for share repurchase?

Well, Ryan, thanks for the question. I would just say, first of all, you observed that we did up our share buyback guidance. 225 to 250. So that's number one. Number two, I know that you understand and know that any proceeds from AXA are not currently baked into our cash plan as a result of the uncertainty that Greg just highlighted. I would always go back to the capital allocation process that we use, and that is fund growth and an appropriate return. We would always look to return capital, and if we're trading below intrinsic value, then we'll use share buybacks, which has been our predominant return of capital, and then opportunistically retired debt. And related to accelerating anything, if I don't have the cash, it's kind of hard to put the cash to work, and I know that you understand that.

Great. Thank you. Thank you.

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question at this time, please press star one.

We will pause for just a moment.

It appears that there are no questions at this time. Ladies and gentlemen, I will now turn the call back over to Mr. Upton for closing comments.

Thank you, Cynthia. Thanks to all who joined the call today. Before we conclude, I wanted to reiterate my confidence in Genworth's direction and in the strength and depth of our leadership team. We remain focused on delivering for our policyholders, our customers, and our shareholders, advancing Care Scout, creating value through enact, and maintaining a disciplined approach to capital allocation. Thank you for your continued interest and investment in Genworth. We look forward to speaking with you again next quarter.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes Genworth Financial's second quarter conference call. Thank you for your participation. At this time, the call will end.