Derivative bets.
Rome is falling and they are the lions.

Third quarter profit alone: "Net income advanced to $3.58 billion"
Net. Not gross.

/Shiat's totally our of control.
//They're stealing ALL the money.

Considering the nasty habit they have of automatically increasing auto insurance by 25 - 30% of people who've had a policy with them for more than a year, I'm not surprised by this.

/not a fan of that policy, or of their method of not counting payment being received until 2-3 days after the check has cleared... not cool guys

HotIgneous Intruder: Third quarter profit alone: "Net income advanced to $3.58 billion"
Net. Not gross.

/Shiat's totally our of control.
//They're stealing ALL the money.

in this case they =Steven Kandarian?

EleventyOne: HotIgneous Intruder: Third quarter profit alone: "Net income advanced to $3.58 billion"
Net. Not gross.

/Shiat's totally our of control.
//They're stealing ALL the money.

in this case they =Steven Kandarian?

Is a corporation that one person or many persons?
You tell me.

Kandarian will be paid appropriately, right? Fat bonus, right?

And before the white knights come out on behalf of these greedy bastards, please tell me exactly where all that money come from?
Hint: It didn't come from selling better products and services.

Don't look for too much out of non-health insuers; as much as it will disappoint many farkers. Many have been taking rate and trying to gently dip into their reserves to get by. At least in previous recessions you could dive into treasuries and ride the storm out.

HotIgneous Intruder: Third quarter profit alone: "Net income advanced to $3.58 billion"
Net. Not gross.

/Shiat's totally our of control.
//They're stealing ALL the money.

Beyold the infantile mentality behind OWS.

What the fark are you talking about? How is profit 'stealing money'? Go start an insurance company if you think those returns are too high, or invest in MetLife to get your piece of this excessive profit. Of course, you don't even realize it but the market cap of Met is over $38b, so the return on market value is only about 9%.

HotIgneous Intruder: EleventyOne: HotIgneous Intruder: Third quarter profit alone: "Net income advanced to $3.58 billion"
Net. Not gross.

/Shiat's totally our of control.
//They're stealing ALL the money.

in this case they =Steven Kandarian?

Is a corporation that one person or many persons?
You tell me.

Kandarian will be paid appropriately, right? Fat bonus, right?

And before the white knights come out on behalf of these greedy bastards, please tell me exactly where all that money come from?
Hint: It didn't come from selling better products and services.

Of course it did. If it sold worse products and higher prices than its competitors, their market share would decline. They made $3.8b in profits of $53b in revenue because customers liked their product better than their competitors'. I have a Metlife insurance policy myself, I looked at their price, compared it to several of their competitors', and bought the Metlife policy.

How is it that someone can live in a market economy their entire lives and not have the most basic understanding of business or supply & demand?

HotIgneous Intruder: And before the white knights come out on behalf of these greedy bastards, please tell me exactly where all that money come from?
Hint: It didn't come from selling better products and services.

Where do you think it came from? Did anybody give them money by threat of violence?

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.
The money came from derivatives investments.
Who paid off on the derivatives?

Who? What firm or entity?
Who cut the check?
I'll wait for an answer to that question before I jump in here again.
(Meanwhile, those of you with the attention spans of gnats who cannot stay focused on that question need to keep the ad homs to yourselves.)

/White knights for capitalists are the stupidest white knights of them all.
//Zero regulation and zero enforcement = 100 percent robbery.

HotIgneous Intruder: Wrong, wrong, and wrong.
The money came from derivatives investments.
Who paid off on the derivatives?

Who? What firm or entity?
Who cut the check?
I'll wait for an answer to that question before I jump in here again.

You should provide an answer to that question yourself. What derivatives is MetLife involved in? Why are they involved in such derivatives? Who (broadly) are their counterparties? How material are the movements in these derivatives to the underlying economics of their business?

I know these answers, but you don't. You just see a number in a press release and assume that MetLife, an insurance company, is just playing in the derivative markets to 'steal' money from the rest of the population.

Read the financials and get an understanding of accounting rules before you spew nonsense.

Simple question: Whose money was it before it was given to Metlife?
Who paid on the derivatives?

Well?


Well?

...crickets...

/Anybody who thinks this kind of financial leveraging and taking is just fine fully deserves what's coming.
//Just cause it's legal, doesn't make it right.

HotIgneous Intruder: //Zero regulation and zero enforcement = 100 percent robbery.

Insurance is one of the most tightly regulated industries in the country.

HotIgneous Intruder: Simple question: Whose money was it before it was given to Metlife?
Who paid on the derivatives?

Well?


Well?

...crickets...

/Anybody who thinks this kind of financial leveraging and taking is just fine fully deserves what's coming.
//Just cause it's legal, doesn't make it right.

Actually, the way insurance companies use derivatives (AIG and the guarantors who wrote CDS excepted) its deleveraging. Metlife is reducing their economic exposure by entering into swaps.

And the counterparty to these swaps were likely banks or broker dealers, who took the opposite position (its likely that Metlife was short S&P 500 futures and used derivatives to bet on declining interest rates). Then, the broker dealer or banks would find a counterparty to take the other side of the trade (like index funds or ETFs whose investors want to be long the S&P 500, or hedge funds or other investors who think interest rates will go up).

By entering into these transactions, MetLife offsets some of the risk from their core operations (variable annuities with embedded guarantees that subject MetLife to equity risk, and long-duration insurance liabilities that end up worse economically when interest rates decline). The accounting doesn't match up exactly on either side of the balance sheet, so you get some volatility unfortunately that doesn't reflect true economics.

Also, the expansion of MetLife's credit spreads contributed $1.3b to earnings this period, as some of their own liabilities reduced in value. No cash changes hands and there is no real economic effect. It's just a ridiculous accounting rule that all investors strip out.

Anyway, now you know better. Hopefully I've quelled some of your misplaced rage allowing you to have a better weekend.

Debeo Summa Credo: Anyway, now you know better. Hopefully I've quelled some of your misplaced rage allowing you to have a better weekend.

Ain't no hate like hate for insurers.

Only 10-fold? Queue up the layoffs. The shareholders must feed.

And this is why I believe all insurance companies should be non-profit and govnmt controlled like auto insurance in some provinces is. Stop the stupid frivilous law suits you Americans seem to thrive on and love thy neighbour a bit more.


/wanna be my neighbour, cutie pie?
//Canadian commie socialist who loves free health care

Ohlookabutterfly: And this is why I believe all insurance companies should be non-profit and govnmt controlled like auto insurance in some provinces is. Stop the stupid frivilous law suits you Americans seem to thrive on and love thy neighbour a bit more.


/wanna be my neighbour, cutie pie?
//Canadian commie socialist who loves free health care

We can't even get states to agree on the determination of fault in an accident. And seeing as how every state and region has their own issues to deal with federal enforcement would become a giant clusterfark in less than 10 minutes.