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PRI, Primerica
Revenue is Term Life Insurance (55%), Investment and Savings Products (38%) and Corporate Segment and Other Operating (7%).
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Next report By 8/9 · the 10-Q for the quarter ended late June · due within 40 days of period end · has filed ~38 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 it is
- A life insurer, collecting premiums for decades and earning a spread on the reserves it invests until claims fall due.
- 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, the measure Berkshire is judged on, has compounded about 13% a year across the record. The float runs about 0.2× 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.
Where the money comes from
read the 10-K →Revenue spreads across 3 segments, the largest Term Life Insurance at 55%.
- Term Life Insurance55%$1.8B
- Investment and Savings Products38%$1.2B
- Corporate Segment and Other Operating7%$224M
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 | |||||||||||
| $1.5B | $1.7B | $1.9B | $2.1B | $2.2B | $2.7B | $2.7B | $2.7B | $3.1B | $3.3B | $3.4B | RevenueRevenue |
| $844M | $961M | $1.1B | $1.2B | $1.3B | $1.5B | $1.6B | $1.7B | $1.7B | $1.8B | — | Premiums written (net)Prem. written |
| $844M | $961M | $1.1B | $1.2B | $1.3B | $1.5B | $1.6B | $1.7B | $1.7B | $1.8B | $1.8B | Premiums earnedPremiums |
| $79M | $79M | $81M | $94M | $84M | $81M | $93M | $136M | $156M | $167M | $169M | Investment incomeInv. inc. |
| $338M | $380M | $416M | $477M | $507M | $644M | $719M | $772M | $939M | $975M | — | Pretax incomePretax |
| $219M | $350M | $324M | $366M | $386M | $477M | $472M | $577M | $471M | $749M | $770M | Net incomeNet inc. |
| 35% | 8% | 22% | 23% | 24% | 26% | 23% | 23% | 23% | 23% | 23% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| $294M | $392M | $478M | $486M | $643M | $657M | $758M | $693M | $862M | $901M | $861M | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| 18% | 25% | 22% | 22% | 21% | 52% | 23% | 28% | 21% | 31% | 31% | Return on equityROE |
| 15% | 22% | 19% | 19% | 18% | 44% | 19% | 23% | 16% | 25% | 25% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| $33M | $36M | $44M | $58M | $64M | $75M | $84M | $94M | $113M | $136M | $139M | Dividends paidDiv. paid |
| $150M | $150M | $210M | $225M | $231M | $19M | $356M | $375M | $425M | $450M | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| ($48M) | ($131M) | ($233M) | ($202M) | ($54M) | ($923M) | ($200M) | ($90M) | ($232M) | ($236M) | — | Investing cash flowInv. cash |
| ($187M) | ($193M) | ($261M) | ($290M) | ($302M) | $108M | ($458M) | ($480M) | ($551M) | ($600M) | — | Financing cash flowFin. cash |
| $572K | $1M | ($2M) | $1M | $3M | $3M | ($3M) | $1M | ($4M) | $2M | — | Exchange-rate effectFX |
| $60M | $68M | ($18M) | ($5M) | $291M | ($155M) | $97M | $124M | $75M | $68M | — | Change in cashΔ cash |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| $2.4B | $2.7B | $3.1B | $3.7B | $3.9B | $4.3B | $4.1B | $4.2B | $4.3B | $4.5B | $4.7B | Investments (total)Investments |
| $268M | $307M | $314M | $340M | $520M | $585M | $538M | $514M | $488M | $495M | $489M | Float (reserves)Float |
| $11.4B | $12.5B | $12.6B | $13.7B | $14.9B | $16.1B | $14.6B | $15.0B | $14.6B | $15.0B | $14.7B | Total assetsAssets |
| $10.2B | $11.0B | $11.1B | $12.0B | $13.1B | $14.0B | $12.6B | $13.0B | $12.3B | $12.6B | — | Total liabilitiesTotal liab. |
| $1.2B | $1.4B | $1.5B | $1.7B | $1.8B | $925M | $2.0B | $2.1B | $2.3B | $2.4B | $2.5B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 47.5M | 45.7M | 44.0M | 42.3M | 40.2M | 39.7M | 38.1M | 36.0M | 34.2M | 32.7M | 31.7M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $4.62 | $7.67 | $7.37 | $8.66 | $9.61 | $12.04 | $12.39 | $16.00 | $13.76 | $22.91 | $24.26 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $0.70 | $0.78 | $1.00 | $1.36 | $1.60 | $1.88 | $2.20 | $2.60 | $3.30 | $4.16 | $4.39 | Dividends / shareDiv/sh |
| $25.74 | $31.06 | $33.23 | $39.05 | $45.69 | $23.34 | $53.31 | $57.34 | $66.06 | $74.84 | $79.42 | Book value / shareBVPS |
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +13.6%/yr | +12.8%/yr |
| EPS | +19.5%/yr | +19.0%/yr |
| Dividends / share | +21.8%/yr | +21.1%/yr |
| Book value / share | +12.6%/yr | +10.4%/yr |
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
Is it a good business?
- Return on equity 31%StrongNet income $749M ÷ equity $2.4BIndustry 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.
- Investment income $167M22.5% on the floatNet investment income $167M, 22.5% 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 $744M0.3× equityPolicy benefits + deposits + guarantees − recoverables − DAC − receivables = $744M
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: receivables deduction unavailable. The larger it is against equity, the more that leverage works, for better or worse.
- the compounding scoreboardEquity $2.4B ÷ 33M 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 −$485KPast promises heldPrior-year development, FY2025: favorable (reserves released) · record: 9 favorable, 1 unfavorable of 10
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 | Glenn J. Williams | $5.1M | $6.5M | $477M |
| 2022 | Glenn J. Williams | $4.8M | $4.2M | $472M |
| 2023 | Glenn J. Williams | $4.2M | $6.8M | $577M |
| 2024 | Glenn J. Williams | $7.2M | $8.9M | $471M |
| 2025 | Glenn J. Williams | $5.6M | $5.7M | $749M |
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.
- Insider ownership<1%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
- CEO pay ratio95:1
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$25M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares in fiscal 2025, 0.7% of revenue, equal to 2.5% 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.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 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% | 4.1% | -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% |
| PRIPrimerica | $3.3B | 23% | — | 2.9% |
| Group median | — | 11% | — | 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 Primerica’s record justifies.
Tangible book / share, delivered23%/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 $2.5B on 31M shares, a 24% 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: ← PRH its page in the Manual PRIM →
Industry order: ← PRH the Insurance — Life & Health chapter PRS →