← All companies ← VNT Manual VOYG → ← UNMA Insurance — Life & Health
VOYA, Voya Financial Inc.
A life insurer, collecting premiums for decades and earning a spread on the reserves it invests until claims fall due.
We are a leading provider of workplace benefits and savings solutions and technologies to U.S. employers, enabling better financial outcomes for their employees and for those who depend on their employees through our retirement solutions, retail wealth services, and a comprehensive portfolio of benefits products.
We are also a leading international asset manager, built on a foundation of institutional-quality fixed income and private asset strategies, with a well-established presence in U.S. markets and a large and growing business managing retail and institutional equity, fixed income and blended strategies for clients in Europe and Asia.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Next report By 11/8 · the 10-Q for the quarter ended late September · due within 40 days of period end · has filed ~37 days after · the wire records it on arrival
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- What moves the needle
- The spread on the float and the growth in book value. What decides it: the gap between what the invested reserves earn and what is credited to policyholders, the mortality and fee margins on top, and the scale of the float against equity. Benefits exceed premiums by design, so a P&C combined ratio is the wrong lens; the risks are interest rates and reserve adequacy. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
- Is it a good business?
- A life insurer is read on the spread it earns on a large float and the growth in book value, not a combined ratio: benefits exceed premiums by design, since claims fall due decades after the premium and are funded by the investment income on accumulated reserves. Book value per share has slipped about 3% a year across the record, though much of that swing is rising rates marking the bond portfolio down through other comprehensive income rather than economic loss. The float runs about 0.1× equity, the leverage that magnifies the spread. Whether the spread holds as rates move, and whether the reserves prove adequate, are what the 10-K decides, not an earnings multiple.
Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2016–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMJun 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| $8.8B | $7.2B | $7.2B | $7.5B | $7.6B | $4.2B | $5.9B | $7.3B | $8.1B | $8.2B | $8.2B | RevenueRevenue |
| $2.8B | $2.1B | $2.1B | $2.3B | $2.4B | ($3.4B) | $2.4B | $2.7B | $3.2B | $2.9B | $2.9B | Premiums earnedPremiums |
| $3.4B | $2.6B | $2.7B | $2.8B | $2.9B | $2.8B | $2.3B | $2.2B | $2.1B | $2.3B | $2.3B | Investment incomeInv. inc. |
| $777M | $385M | $521M | $574M | $352M | $3.1B | $428M | $678M | $799M | $837M | — | Pretax incomePretax |
| ($327M) | ($3.0B) | $762M | ($360M) | ($206M) | $2.4B | $510M | $625M | $667M | $654M | $608M | Net incomeNet inc. |
| -4% | — | 7% | — | -5% | -1% | -1% | -8% | 7% | 12% | 15% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| $3.7B | $1.6B | $1.9B | $1.3B | $1.4B | $22M | $1.4B | $1.6B | $1.3B | $1.3B | $1.2B | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| -3% | -30% | 9% | -4% | -2% | 29% | 15% | 15% | 17% | 13% | 13% | Return on equityROE |
| −3% | −30% | 9% | −4% | −2% | 28% | 13% | 12% | 12% | 10% | 9% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| $8M | $8M | $6M | $44M | $36M | $36M | $83M | $127M | $171M | $178M | $178M | Dividends paidDiv. paid |
| $687M | $923M | $1.0B | $1.1B | $516M | $1.1B | $750M | $369M | $640M | $200M | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| ($3.7B) | ($2.4B) | ($282M) | ($1.3B) | ($2.5B) | ($327M) | ($1.9B) | $2.5B | $481M | ($1.4B) | — | Investing cash flowInv. cash |
| $389M | ($349M) | ($1.8B) | ($121M) | $1.7B | ($265M) | $28M | ($4.1B) | ($1.4B) | ($85M) | — | Financing cash flowFin. cash |
| $398M | ($1.2B) | ($178M) | ($66M) | $603M | ($570M) | ($566M) | $111M | $396M | ($166M) | — | Change in cashΔ cash |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| $63.8B | $66.1B | $50.6B | $53.7B | $56.9B | $45.6B | — | — | — | — | — | Investments (total)Investments |
| $62.7B | $63.8B | $48.6B | $49.1B | $51.1B | $51.5B | $50.2B | $46.9B | $44.9B | $49.8B | — | Float (life basis)Float |
| $214.6B | $222.5B | $155.4B | $169.0B | $180.5B | $171.3B | $146.6B | $157.1B | $163.9B | $178.9B | $182.9B | Total assetsAssets |
| $200.6B | $211.5B | $146.4B | $158.8B | $169.3B | $161.4B | $141.6B | $151.0B | $157.9B | $171.8B | — | Total liabilitiesTotal liab. |
| — | — | — | — | — | $0 | $166M | $175M | $219M | $222M | — | Redeemable interestsRedeemable |
| $973M | $1.0B | — | $822M | $1.1B | $1.6B | $1.5B | $1.7B | $1.8B | $1.9B | — | Noncontrolling interestsNCI |
| $13.0B | $10.0B | $8.2B | $9.3B | $10.1B | $8.3B | $3.3B | $4.2B | $4.0B | $5.0B | $4.7B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 203M | 184M | 168M | 147M | 132M | 126M | 110M | 109M | 101M | 97.4M | 93.4M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $-1.61 | $-16.25 | $4.53 | $-2.45 | $-1.56 | $18.84 | $4.63 | $5.74 | $6.58 | $6.71 | $6.51 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $0.04 | $0.04 | $0.04 | $0.30 | $0.27 | $0.29 | $0.75 | $1.17 | $1.69 | $1.83 | $1.91 | Dividends / shareDiv/sh |
| $64.11 | $54.37 | $48.47 | $63.53 | $76.65 | $65.60 | $30.39 | $38.54 | $39.50 | $50.85 | $50.16 | Book value / shareBVPS |
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +7.6%/yr | +7.7%/yr |
| Dividends / share | +53.1%/yr | +46.3%/yr |
| Book value / share | −2.5%/yr | −7.9%/yr |
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
Is it a good business?
- Return on equity 13%SolidNet income $654M ÷ equity $5.0BIndustry peers: median 10%
What this means
What it earns on shareholders' capital, the underwriting result plus what the float earns invested. Durably above the ~10% cost of equity is what compounds book value.
- Earning more than it credits(Investment income $2.3B − interest credited $1.1B) ÷ float $49.8B
What this means
The life insurer's engine in one figure: what the float earns invested, less what is credited to policyholders, as a share of the float. A durable positive spread is the business; a negative one means the promises cost more than the portfolio produces.
The float and book value
- Float $49.8B10.1× equityPolicy benefits + deposits + guarantees − recoverables − DAC − receivables = $49.8B
What this means
Money held against future claims and invested in the meantime. Buffett's insight was that good underwriting makes this float cost less than nothing, a pool of other people's money the owners earn on. Basis note: DAC deduction unavailable; receivables deduction unavailable. The larger it is against equity, the more that leverage works, for better or worse.
- the compounding scoreboardEquity $5.0B ÷ 97M shares
What this means
A life insurer is judged the way Berkshire is, by the growth in book value per share over the years as the spread on the float and the mortality and fee margins compound into equity. This is the level today; the record below shows whether it has grown. Note that reported book value swings with interest rates, which mark the bond portfolio up and down through other comprehensive income.
The reserves
- Reserve development +$36MPast reserves fell shortPrior-year development, FY2025: unfavorable (past years strengthened) · record: 1 favorable, 2 unfavorable of 3
In the filing’s words Management’s narrative describes the year’s prior-year development as favorable, while the development line filed in the structured data is signed unfavorable. The two disagree, so neither is quoted as the fact here — read the filing linked above.
What this means
Each year an insurer restates what its old accident years actually cost. Persistent favorable development means management reserved honestly and released the cushion; persistent unfavorable development means past profits were overstated by under-reserving — the industry's chronic sin, and the single most tell-tale line an owner can read. Signed as the company files it: negative favorable, positive unfavorable.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
Management, ownership & pay
read the proxy →From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.
| Fiscal year | Chief executive | Pay, as filed | “Actually paid” | Net income |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | — | $16.0M | $19.8M | $2.4B |
| 2022 | — | $14.7M | $13.2M | $510M |
| 2023 | — | $8.7M | $11.0M | $625M |
| 2024 | — | $9.7M | $6.5M | $667M |
| 2025 | Heather Lavallee | $12.6M | $13.3M | $654M |
Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Net income is the whole business's, as filed, for the same fiscal years. A dash under the name means the filing tags the figure without naming the officer.
- CEO pay ratio155:1
What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2026 proxy. A high ratio alone settles nothing; some businesses are genuinely top-heavy in scarce skill. A runaway figure is where Buffett starts asking whether the board is doing its job.
- Stock-based compensation$72M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares in fiscal 2025, 0.9% of revenue, equal to 6.9% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.
What an owner would ask, FY2025
read the 10-K →- Which reported numbers are a judgment call?Management names Income taxes, Acquisitions, Insurance reserves as critical estimates
each rests partly on management's judgment; the filing's note sets out the assumptionsverify →
The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.
Peers, Insurance — Life & Health
The same industry, side by side on the spread-and-book-value lens. Each column names the period it is read over; the group median at the foot is the line to read each figure against.
| Company | Revenuelatest FY, USD | ROEmedian over the record | Yield on floatmedian over the record | Return on assetsmedian over the record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LNCLincoln National | $18.2B | 11% | 4.1% | 0.4% |
| PUKPrudential Public Limited Company | $11.5B | 10% | — | 0.4% |
| VOYAVoya Financial Inc. | $8.2B | 11% | 5.0% | 0.4% |
| GNWGenworth Financial Inc | $7.3B | 2% | 4.9% | 0.3% |
| BHFBrighthouse Financial Inc. | $6.8B | 2% | 4.9% | -0.0% |
| JXNJackson Financial Inc. | $6.7B | 9% | 7.6% | 0.3% |
| GLGlobe Life Inc. | $6.0B | 20% | 8.6% | 3.5% |
| FGF&G Annuities & Life Inc. | $5.7B | 16% | 5.1% | 0.8% |
| Group median | — | 11% | 5.0% | 0.4% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
price / tangible bookAn insurer is worth a multiple of its tangible book value, and the multiple it deserves is set by the return it earns on that book. Type today’s price; we show what you would be paying against what Voya Financial Inc.’s record justifies.
Tangible book / share, delivered−18%/yr’20→’25
The justified multiple is (return on tangible equity − growth) ÷ (cost of equity − growth). An insurer earning exactly its cost of equity is worth about one times tangible book; the premium above that prices each point of durable excess return. A higher cost of equity lowers the justified multiple for an insurer.
Enter a price above to run it.
Graham applied the same standards to financial enterprises (Intelligent Investor ch.14): the 15× multiple cap on averaged earnings, and P/E times price-to-book at most 22.5. The gate marks the bargain-hunter’s floor, not a verdict.
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
Tangible book $3.0B on 91M shares, a 15% normalized return on it. The dials set the multiple such a return would justify; your price sets the multiple you are paying. It assumes the insurer keeps earning that return; an underwriting cycle, a reserve shortfall or a bad year on the float changes it, which is what the record and the 10-K are for.
Manual order: ← VNT its page in the Manual VOYG →
Industry order: ← UNMA the Insurance — Life & Health chapter