Share count
354Mpeak FY2016
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PRU, Prudential Financial Inc.
Insurance — Life & Health financial
Prudential Financial is a life insurer and retirement business with a large in-house asset manager, PGIM. It sells individual life insurance and annuities, group benefits to employers, and institutional retirement deals — taking whole corporate pension plans onto its books — with sizable operations abroad, notably in Japan. It earns the spread between what it invests premiums and deposits at and what it owes the insured, plus fees on the money PGIM and its other arms manage for outside investors.
We offer these products and services to individual and institutional customers through proprietary and third-party distribution networks.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Revenue · FY2025
$60.8B
−13.7% YoY · 1% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $62.8B 5-yr avg $62.7B
Revenue $15.5B +15.3% vs yr-ago qtr
Net income $606M yr-ago $742M
Net margin 3.9% yr-ago 5.5%
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
- This is two businesses bolted together, and each has its own lever. The insurance and retirement book is a spread-and-longevity bet: whether Prudential prices mortality and how long people draw down savings correctly, and earns more investing the premiums than it owes — exposed to interest rates that reset what new money earns, and to taking on pension obligations whose cost it must estimate decades ahead. The asset-management arm is a fee business in a field the filing calls intensely competitive, where fee compression is the quiet way a manager decays and weak results would starve the next mandate. International, chiefly Japan, adds currency and a different rate world. The bad case is a credit cycle that marks down the assets while markets pull the fees down at once. The record below carries the margins, the returns, and the assets it oversees.
- 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 1% 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 8.3× 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.
Drafted from the company's filings and reviewed by hand; every number is shown in full in the sections below.
Where the money comes from
read the 10-K →39% of revenue comes from outside the United States.
Revenue by geography, FY2025
- United States61%$36.8B
- Japan22%$13.5B
- Other Countries17%$10.5B
From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.
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 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| $58.8B | $59.7B | $63.0B | $64.8B | $57.0B | $71.2B | $56.9B | $54.0B | $70.4B | $60.8B | $62.8B | RevenueRevenue |
| $31.0B | $32.1B | $35.8B | $34.2B | $31.1B | $34.0B | $36.5B | $27.4B | $42.9B | $30.8B | $32.2B | Premiums earnedPremiums |
| $15.5B | $16.4B | $16.2B | $17.6B | $17.4B | $18.3B | $16.0B | $17.9B | $19.9B | $21.5B | $22.0B | Investment incomeInv. inc. |
| $4.4B | $7.9B | $4.1B | $4.2B | ($374M) | $8.9B | ($1.6B) | $2.5B | $2.7B | $3.6B | $3.5B | Net incomeNet inc. |
| 23% | — | 17% | 18% | — | 18% | — | 20% | 16% | 23% | 22% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| $14.9B | $13.5B | $21.7B | $19.6B | $8.4B | $9.8B | $5.2B | $6.5B | $8.5B | $6.3B | $9.8B | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| 10% | 14% | 8% | 7% | -1% | 14% | -5% | 9% | 10% | 11% | 11% | Return on equityROE |
| 7% | 12% | 5% | 4% | −3% | 11% | −11% | 2% | 3% | 5% | 5% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| $238.1B | $254.5B | $271.0B | $290.6B | $303.4B | $287.6B | $261.8B | $273.3B | $268.9B | $266.9B | $266.9B | Float (reserves)Float |
| $784.0B | $832.1B | $815.1B | $896.6B | $940.7B | $937.6B | $689.0B | $721.2B | $735.6B | $773.7B | $765.4B | Total assetsAssets |
| $21.6B | $21.3B | $21.8B | $21.8B | $21.5B | $19.5B | $21.8B | $19.4B | $18.5B | $19.7B | $20.5B | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| $45.9B | $54.2B | $48.6B | $63.1B | $67.4B | $61.9B | $30.6B | $27.8B | $27.9B | $32.4B | $32.0B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 447M | 436M | 426M | 411M | 396M | 390M | 372M | 365M | 359M | 354M | 349M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $9.78 | $18.03 | $9.56 | $10.19 | $-0.94 | $22.73 | $-4.42 | $6.82 | $7.59 | $10.11 | $9.92 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $2.91 | $2.97 | $3.57 | $3.99 | $4.46 | $4.65 | $4.88 | $5.06 | $5.26 | $5.45 | $5.54 | Dividends / shareDiv/sh |
| $102.69 | $124.39 | $114.07 | $153.60 | $170.35 | $158.62 | $82.17 | $76.30 | $77.57 | $91.71 | $91.51 | Book value / shareBVPS |
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +3.0%/yr | +3.6%/yr |
| EPS | +0.4%/yr | — |
| Dividends / share | +7.2%/yr | +4.1%/yr |
| Book value / share | −1.2%/yr | −11.6%/yr |
The record, charted
FY2016–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Revenue
$60.8Blow FY2023
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →
Is it a good business?
- Return on equity 11%SolidNet income $3.6B ÷ equity $32.4BIndustry peers: median 11%
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.
- Investment income $21.5B8.0% on the floatNet investment income $21.5B, 8.0% on the float
What this means
What the float and capital earned this year. This is the second engine: an insurer that breaks even on underwriting still wins if the float is large and invested well.
The float and book value
- Float (reserves) $266.9B8.2× equityLoss and claim reserves $266.9B, 8.2× equity
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. Measured here from loss and claim reserves only; it excludes unearned premiums and funds held, so the true float is somewhat larger than shown. The larger it is against equity, the more that leverage works, for better or worse.
- the compounding scoreboardEquity $32.4B ÷ 354M 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.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Low contestabilityThe moat is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded, the kind AI cuts costs within but does not contest.
In its own filing Named as a competitive risk
Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.
“Further, our ability to continue to develop and efficiently deploy AI technologies depends on access to specific third-party equipment and other physical infrastructure, such as processing hardware and network capacity, as to which we cannot control the availability or pricing, especially in a highly competitive enviro…”
AI is unlikely to contest a moat that is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded; here it reads more as a cost tool than a threat, and the company is using it that way.
Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
Debt maturity
the debt note, SEC EDGAR →Not how much it owes, but when it falls due, and against what. The ladder the company files, beside cash on hand and a year's owner earnings.
Bars scaled to the largest single year.
Due in the next 12 months$63Mthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year
Within two years$730Mthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions
Biggest single year$17.3Bin 2031the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest
Due over the next five years$18.9Bthe near slice; the balance sheet carries $20.3B of debt in all
Against what the business has and earns
Cash & short-term investments, Mar 31, 2026$20.5B
Together, against $63M due next year325.8×
Cash on hand as of Mar 31, 2026 comes to $20.5B against the $63M due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: 326 times it.
Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.
Acquisitions & goodwill
from the balance sheet & the 10-year cash-flow recordGoodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.
Goodwill & intangibles$1.5B0% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired
Against book equity3%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital
Cash spent acquiring$0over 10 years buying other businesses
$2.1B written down across 3 years (2021, 2022, 2023): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. A write-down costs no cash (the cash went out when the deal was signed), but it is management marking its own past judgment to market.
Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 10-year record, from the company's own filings.
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 | Pay, as filed | “Actually paid” | Net income |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $19.8M | $31.1M | $8.9B |
| 2022 | $20.1M | $10.2M | ($1.6B) |
| 2023 | $19.2M | $17.5M | $2.5B |
| 2024 | $28.2M | $32.7M | $2.7B |
| 2025 | $11.4M | $10.5M | $3.6B |
| 2025 | $18.6M | $16.7M | $3.6B |
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.
What an owner would ask, FY2025
read the 10-K →- Which reported numbers are a judgment call?Management names Stock compensation 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 figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.
| Company | Revenue | ROE | Yield on float | Return on assets |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| METMetLife Inc. | $77.1B | 9% | — | 0.7% |
| ALLAllstate Corp. | $67.7B | 13% | 7.9% | 2.5% |
| PRUPrudential Financial Inc. | $60.8B | 9% | 6.4% | 0.5% |
| CBChubb Ltd. | $59.5B | 9% | 5.1% | 2.6% |
| ATHSAthene Holding Ltd | $25.7B | 14% | — | 0.9% |
| RGAReinsurance Group of America | $23.7B | 9% | — | 1.0% |
| CRBGCorebridge Financial Inc. | $19.0B | 14% | — | 0.6% |
| LNCLincoln National | $18.2B | 11% | 14.4% | 0.4% |
| Group median | — | 10% | 7.1% | 0.8% |
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 Prudential Financial Inc.’s record justifies.
$
The assumptions
Tangible book / share, delivered−14%/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.
Price / tangible book—
Justified by the return—
Normalized return on tangible equity10%
Price / book—
Earnings yield—
P/E (3-yr avg ’23–’25)—
Graham’s price gate—
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 $30.5B on 347M shares, a 10% 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.
Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Prudential Financial Inc. (PRU), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/PRU, data as of 2026-07-09.
Manual order: ← PRTH its page in the Manual PRVA →
Industry order: ← PRS the Insurance — Life & Health chapter PUK →