Earn dependable income from these insurers

Article Excerpt

These two Canadian insurers continue to offer investors strong long-term growth prospects, as well as dependable dividends. We see both as solid long-term buys. MANULIFE FINANCIAL CORP. $44 is a buy. The company (Toronto symbol MFC; Conservative-Growth Payer Portfolio; Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.7 billion; Market cap: $74.8 billion; Dividend yield: 4.0%; Dividend Sustainability Rating: Above Average; www.manulife.ca) is Canada’s largest life insurer. It’s also a leading insurer in Vietnam, Cambodia, Singapore, and the Philippines. Manulife raised your quarterly dividend by 10.0% with the March 2025 payment. Investors received $0.44 a share instead of $0.40. The new annual rate of $1.76 yields 4.0%. Its $5.4 billion reinsurance agreement in January 2025, along with an earlier one with the Reinsurance Group of America (RGA), has reduced Manulife’s long-term-care reserves by 18%. That releases as much as $800 million in capital for buybacks of up to 3% of outstanding shares. The company’s first quarter earnings rose 3.3%, to $1.77 billion from $1.71 billion a year earlier. However, excluding currency rates,…