Unum Group

noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you'd like to withdraw your question, press star one again. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Matt Royal, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations. You may begin.

Great. Thank you, Mandeep, and good morning to everybody. Welcome to Unim Group's second quarter 2024 earnings call. Please note that today's call may include forward-looking statements, and actual results, which are subject to risks and uncertainties, may differ materially, and we are not obligated to update any of these statements. Please refer to our earnings release and periodic filings with the SEC for a description of factors that could cause actual results to differ from expected results. Yesterday afternoon, Unum released our second quarter earnings press release and financial supplement. Those materials may be found on the investor section of our website along with a presentation of the most directly comparable gap measures and reconciliations of any non-gap financial measures included in today's presentation. References made today to core operation sales and premiums, which includes Unum International, are presented on a constant currency basis. Participating in this morning's conference call are Unum's President and CEO Rick McKinney, Chief Financial Officer Steve Zabel, Tim Arnold, who heads our Colonial Life and Voluntary Benefits lines, Chris Pine for Group Benefits, and Mark Till, CEO of Unum International. Now, let me turn it to Rick for his comments.

Thank you, Matt. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. We're excited to discuss our second quarter results the robust performance in the first half of the year, and trends we see carrying us into the back half of 2024 and into 2025. Our purpose-driven team has done an excellent job navigating the change in the environment and our market over the last several years, and we are most appreciative of their efforts. This quarter, we saw the continuation of some favorable trends and notable improvements in multiple areas of performance, leading us to increase our earnings per share outlook for 2024. Our results thus far in 2024 evidence the way we approach the employee benefits markets and growth orientation is really paying off. We are actively engaging with new and existing customers and growing our top line while maintaining healthy industry leading margins. As we move forward, we are poised to continue on a growth trajectory in the second half of the year. Our strategic initiatives and diligent execution have set a strong foundation. and we are confident in our ability to sustain this momentum. We're excited to see our outlook for opportunities for the next year, building and reflecting the prospects for continued success. As we stand here today, our team is supported by distinctive technologies and remains fully committed to delivering for our clients each and every day. Focusing on our second quarter, it reflects sustained broad-based performance. We saw statutory earnings surpassing $350 million and earnings per share reaching $2.16 per share, marking yet another record level of earnings for the company. Our top line was healthy, with a 5.4% increase in core operations premium growth, and capital metrics significantly exceeded our targets. Given our robust results and positive outlook, we're adjusting our full-year earnings per share growth outlook from the previous 7% to 9% to double-digit growth of 10% to 15%. Our exclusive focus on the group benefits markets continues to offer a promising landscape for client growth and expansion. This is further bolstered by the inherent tailwinds in our business, stemming from what we consider natural growth factors, such as an increasing covered employee base and wage levels. Consequently, we are well positioned to enhance our top line growth through various cycles, a trend we have consistently observed over this past decade. The second quarter was consistent with this view and the outlook for the economy, with job growth continuing and wage increases more than the norm. We see this reflected in our existing client base, where we witnessed sustained natural growth that contributed to our trajectory. In addition to the labor market, we continue to be happy with where rates are for the 10 and 30-year Treasury, at levels similar to those during our prior call. Current rate levels are beneficial as we continue to invest new money above our portfolio yields. While we were able to adjust our core businesses based on longer-term movements in rates, we continue to take steps to de-risk our exposure within the closed block, which we've now done for the last 10 consecutive quarters through both our hedging program and asset repositioning. Altogether, the macro backdrop aids us in steadily and consistently building on our solid foundation and delivering profitable growth and strong returns across all of our businesses. Looking across the franchise, results in Unum US were highlighted by a 5.5% top line premium growth and strong persistency levels. The opportunistic nature of large case sales drove the lighter headline result for our group products. However, we were pleased with the underlying results, including nearly 12% sales growth in our less than 2,000 employee group segment. and remain confident in achieving our full-year growth expectations from a margin perspective. Group disability experienced another strong quarter, where recoveries drove low historical benefit levels, and we expect similar experience trends to persist. The group life and AD&D segment had another standout quarter, with both strong top-line premium as well as favorable benefits experience in the quarter. In our Colonial Life franchise, margins continued to be excellent, with an ROE of 20%. Premiums grew nearly 4% through the first six months of the year with strong persistency and sales which rebounded nicely compared to the first quarter. Rounding out our core segments, our international business had another quarter operating at full strength with robust premium growth of nearly 9% and UK underlying earnings in excess of 30 million pounds. We continue to see excellent growth momentum in our growing Poland business And in the UK, continue to redefine the broker experience, setting a market-leading standard that is distinctively Unum and enhancing our relationship management model. From an overall return perspective, our commitment to innovation, prudent capital management, and shareholder returns remains unwavering. As anticipated, our long-term CARES capital buffer is in a healthy position, so substantial free cash flow generation of our core businesses flows straight to a capital position of strength and deployment flexibility. Statutory earnings through the first half of the year totaled over $700 million, putting us on pace to reach the top end of our outlook range for the year for capital generation. This adds to a balance sheet that is strong, with ample levels of cash and RBC at 470%. Considering these factors, we're pleased with our new board authorization of $1 billion for share repurchase. as it illustrates the level of confidence we have in the sustainability of our business results. Our capital priorities remain intact, that is, investing in our businesses organically and inorganically, and then returning capital to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. As such, we will be prudent with the pace at which we exhaust the authorization, but plan to increase our pace in the back half of the year. This is significant, as entering the year, we plan to repurchase $500 million of stock, which represents a doubling of the amount we repurchased in 2023. This increased authorization is a testament to the robust position of the business, as well as the immense value we see in our shares, with book value per share, excluding AOCI, crossing the $70 mark. In summary, we're pleased by the positive trends across our operations and the supportive macro environment. The second quarter marked another period of strength for the company and served as an important milestone for the year. We remain forward looking, ensuring we are well positioned to execute our strategy and achieve our revised outlook of 10 to 15% earnings per share growth. Thank you once again for joining us, and let me turn it over to Steve for some of the details.