AM Best Affirms Credit Ratings of Members of ReliaStar Life Insurance Group
AM Best has affirmed the Financial Strength Rating of A (Excellent) and the Long-Term Issuer Credit Ratings of “a+” (Excellent) for ReliaStar Life Insurance Company of New York (Woodbury, NY) and ReliaStar Life Insurance Company (Minneapolis, MN), collectively known as ReliaStar Life Insurance Group (ReliaStar). The outlook for these Credit Ratings (ratings) is stable.
Both companies are life insurance subsidiaries of Voya Financial Inc. (Voya), headquartered in New York, NY.
The ratings reflect ReliaStar’s strong balance sheet strength, which AM Best assesses as very strong, along with its adequate operating performance, neutral business profile, and appropriate enterprise risk management (ERM).
AM Best also noted ReliaStar’s adequate level of risk-adjusted capitalization, as measured by Best’s Capital Adequacy Ratio (BCAR), and a trend of generally favorable operating results from its health business.
AM Best also notes that a reduction in surplus levels is primarily due to dividends distributed to the parent organization as risk-based capital (RBC) levels are managed across entities. ReliaStar’s RBC remains above the company-stipulated minimum and is expected to increase due to recent strategic movements into less capital-intensive products.
Voya, ReliaStar’s parent company, remains well-capitalized and maintains a well-diversified set of income sources. Voya exited the individual life and annuity segments in recent years, reducing its overall product risk and the need for capital.
ReliaStar’s strengths are partially countered by its less-diversified business profile due to exiting markets via the sale of in-force life and annuity blocks of business. This creates a more focused business profile and relies on highly competitive, lower-margin, fee-based business.
The sale of in-force blocks has led to greater reinsurance dependence. However, its remaining product lines, including stop-loss, life and disability, and annuities, are geographically and market segment diversified.
ERM functions remain in line with its industry peers and are fully integrated between ReliaStar and its parent company, Voya.
This press release relates to Credit Ratings published on AM Best’s website. For all rating information related to the release, together with pertinent disclosures, including details of the office responsible for issuing each of the individual ratings referenced in this release, please see AM Best’s Recent Rating Activity web page.
For more information regarding the use and limitations of Credit Rating opinions, please see Guide to Best’s Credit Ratings. For information on the proper use of Best’s Credit Ratings, Best’s Performance Assessments, Best’s Preliminary Credit Assessments and AM Best press releases, please see Guide to Proper Use of Best’s Ratings & Assessments.
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