MetLife, Inc.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the MetLife Third Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. This time, all participants are in a listening-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. Instructions will be given at that time. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. Before we get started, I refer you to the cautionary notes about forward-looking statements in yesterday's earnings release and to risk factors discussed in MetLife's SEC filings. With that, I will turn the call over to John Hall, Global Head of Investor Relations.

Thank you, Operator. Good morning, all. We appreciate you joining MetLife's third quarter 2024 earnings call. Before we begin, I point you to the information on non-GAAP measures on the investor relations portion of MetLife.com, in our earnings release, and in our quarterly financial supplements, which you should review. On the call this morning are Michelle Halaf, President and Chief Executive Officer, and John McCallion, Chief Financial Officer. Other members of senior management are also available to participate. We released our supplemental slides last night. and they are available on our website. John McCallion will speak to them in his prepared remarks. An appendix to the slides features disclosures, gap reconciliations, and other information for your review. Q&A will follow prepared remarks and will end just before the top of the hour. As a reminder, please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. On to Michelle.

Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. Last night, MetLife reported third quarter results, which, while absorbing pressure on variable investment income, affirmed the financial attractiveness of our businesses. Taking a wider view, year-to-date adjusted earnings per share, excluding notable items, are up 12%, pointing to our broader base momentum and a favorable underlying environment for our global set of market-leading businesses. In the U.S., unemployment remains at historically low levels, inflation appears to be under control, and the yield curve has started to see a positive slope beyond two years. These are conditions that favor both our group benefits and our retirement and income solutions businesses. Outside the U.S., we are seeing a promising backdrop for many of our key markets. For instance, in Japan, the combination of modest inflation, the 10-year JGB near 1%, and government incentives to save has the potential to put money in motion, moving from the sidelines and into the investment and insurance products MetLife offers. Elsewhere around the world, in Mexico, nearshoring activities can put more people to work and at higher wages, which is good for the Mexican economy as well as for our business there. While in Brazil, the rapid adoption of digital distribution channels for financial products is democratizing financial services and bringing them to a wider audience of customers. Still, the geopolitical conditions that persist in many regions remain challenging, and we have an election here in the U.S. next week. Yet, throughout its 156-year history, MetLife has successfully managed risk and found opportunity in uncertain times. Our purpose, always with you, building a more confident future, resonates at times like these, and I have every confidence that MetLife will continue to create value for our customers, shareholders, and other stakeholders going forward. Turning to the quarter, we reported adjusted earnings of $1.4 billion, or $1.95 per share. After reflecting net positive notable items from our annual actuarial assumption review and other insurance adjustments, adjusted earnings per share totaled $1.93 per share. Recurring interest margins, underwriting, and foreign currency exchange rates were all less favorable than a year ago, partially offset by volume growth and higher equity markets. As we had previously indicated, private equity returns came in below expectations, leading variable investment income, or VII, to dip under the prior year period results. At the same time, real estate and other fund returns improved sequentially, extending the trend we've seen develop through the year. In the quarter, our key performance metrics reflect the power of our business. MetLife posted a 14.6% adjusted return on equity, and we are on track to exceed our 13 to 15% target range for the full year. This further demonstrates our focus on deploying capital to generate responsible growth and high returns. And our efficiency mindset was evident in MetLife's third quarter direct expense ratio of 11.7%, an improvement year over year and below our 12.3% annual target. Shifting to business segment results, our group benefits business reported adjusted earnings of $431 million, excluding notable items, down from a strong underwriting quarter a year ago. On a year-to-date basis, also excluding notable items, adjusted earnings are up 7%. Our scale and broad product range have long been points of competitive differentiation for our group benefits business. contributing to our adjusted premiums, fees, and other revenue growth. In the quarter, adjusted PFOs, excluding the policies, rose 5.3%. For the year-to-date period, adjusted PFOs on the same basis similarly grew 5.5%. With employee benefits enrollment season again upon us, this year, more than 1 million U.S. employees will be able to make their enrollment experiences easier by using MetLife's UPWISE, a newly developed tool to help them choose and use their benefits. UPwise simplifies benefit selection by making custom recommendations based on an employee's individual needs and preferences. And UPwise is important because our research shows that more informed benefit selection decisions lead to a more engaged and productive workforce, a win for employees and employers. Moving to Retirement and Income Solutions, or RIS, Adjusted earnings, excluding notable items, totaled $368 million in the quarter, reflecting the impact of interest rate caps maturing. Sales of stable value and UK longevity reinsurance remained strong, and we maintain our leadership position in the competitive jumbo pension risk transfer space. With a strong start to the fourth quarter, we've now closed $5.6 billion of PRT sales so far in 2024. We published our annual pension risk transfer poll last month, which continues to point to a robust pension risk transfer pipeline. The 2024 poll found that among companies with defined benefit pension de-risking goals, a full 93% intend to completely divest their plans, up from 89% in the 2023 poll. Moreover, about half of these companies plan to divest in the next two to five years. Turning to Asia, adjusted earnings excluding notable items were $347 million. down 6% from the year-ago quarter on market-related items partially offset by favorable underwriting margins. On a year-to-date basis, adjusted earnings grew 16%. Asia's general account assets under management, a key measure for this region, grew 6% year-over-year on a constant currency basis. Looking to Latin America, we saw strong bottom line results with adjusted earnings excluding notable items of $217 million rising 9% from a year ago. On a constant currency basis, sales and adjusted PFOs both grew double digits. Our momentum in Latin America has been building for some time. This can be seen in Brazil, where we have seized upon the growing adoption of digital distribution of financial services to partner with some of the leading players in that market. To capture this opportunity, we have deployed an integrated technology solution called Accelerator, which allows us to meet customers where they are. MetLife Accelerator helps leading banks, retailers, and other companies offer insurance to their customers with a simple, frictionless, and fully digital insurance experience. Starting in Brazil, we branched out to bring this innovative technology to other core markets in Latin America, including Mexico and Chile, with more than 4 million Enforce customers in the region since launching a year ago. For some time now, we have spoken about the importance of value of new business as a critical management tool. Our focus and the intensity of our execution across this metric is truly impressive. For 2023, we generated a 19% internal rate of return on $3.6 billion of capital deployed, creating VNB of $2.6 billion with a payback period of roughly five years. It is even more impressive when you consider the substantial progress we've made over the course of the Next Horizon timeframe, a 400 basis point increase in IRR, and a two-year decrease in payback period, all of which adds up to more cash sooner. As you can see from our VNB numbers, MetLife prioritizes organic growth with attractive payback periods and internal rates of return. We also favor strategic inorganic growth with similar financial characteristics. When appropriate organic and inorganic opportunities are not available, we will return capital to shareholders via share repurchase while also generating attractive IRRs. Our track record proves this out. In the third quarter, we were again active in capital management and returned close to $1.2 billion to shareholders via common stock dividends and share repurchase. We distributed common stock dividends of roughly $400 million and bought back approximately $800 million of our common shares. This brings total common stock repurchase through the third quarter to about $2.8 billion. We still have more than $2 billion remaining on our board authorization. Finally, at the end of the third quarter, we had $4.5 billion of cash and liquid assets at our holding companies, which is above our target cash buffer of $3 to $4 billion. To wrap up, we are moving closer to our December 12th investor day, where we are excited to roll out our next five-year strategy, New Frontier. As I have mentioned, New Frontier is not a radical change in direction for MetLife. Rather, it takes us to places where we have the right to win. It is a growth platform that builds on the success of Next Horizon and provides a pathway to lead MetLife to even stronger performance in the future. We are in a much different position than we were five years ago, more front-footed, and oriented toward offense versus defense. I look forward to expanding on the precepts of New Frontier, which are anchored on accelerating growth, boosting returns, and fostering greater consistency. Now, I'll turn it over to John to cover our quarterly performance in more detail. Thank you, Michel, and good morning.