If you have a life insurance policy or an annuity with Lincoln Financial (or formerly Jefferson Pilot Insurance), you need to be paying attention and asking some questions of your state’s Insurance Commissioner.
Lincoln announced today that it is raising capital, including taking TARP funds. Lincoln is publicly traded and the stock dropped like a rock last September. The only plausible explanation for raising capital is they are facing questions about the solvency of their insurance funds.
Lincoln also happens to own 15 radio stations, but that’s secondary to the news today. They are a tiny portion of the assets of the company – last year, the wrote down the value of their Radio licenses by about $200 million.
Poking around in their 10-Q from March, the large majority of their assets are invested in Corporate bonds (think GM or Chrysler, perhaps). They also have significant investments in residential and commerical mortgages (the really safe stuff that you can never lose money on because real estate always goes up). Very little of their money is in government bonds.
In January 2009, Lincoln “purchased” a tiny Savings and Loan so that the company could qualify as a Savings and Loan and be eligible to particpate in TARP.
Lincoln’s stock symbol is LNC – the stock has dropped 7.2% today.