Allianz Life Maintains Pole Position in Indexed Annuity Sales
August 24, 2017 by Jay Cooper
Indexed annuities remain a top selling annuity product, and Allianz Life is maintaining a dominant market position in the category. There were few other changes among the ranks of top-selling fixed annuity providers, according to Wink’s second quarter Sales and Market Report. Wink sales data was released late Tuesday, and carriers could not be reached for comment by deadline.
The Wink report tracks quarterly sales and market share of annuity providers in the indexed annuity, fixed annuity and multi-year guaranteed annuity categories. Sales leaders in other categories can be found in the rest of the article.
Allianz held 15% market share within the indexed annuities space, followed by Athene USA, Nationwide, American Equity Companies and Great American Insurance Group. Allianz Life’s Allianz 222 was the top-selling indexed annuity for the 12th consecutive quarter.
The five carriers were all within the top five in the first quarter as well, though there was some shuffling among the leaders. American Equity Companies ranked second in sales in the first quarter, but fell to fourth this time around. In the first quarter Athene ranked third, Nationwide fourth and Great American Insurance Group fifth.
Indexed annuities remain the top-selling category among the non-variable annuity segments Wink tracks. Total indexed annuity sales were a little over $14.6 billion, up 13.3% from last quarter, but down 6% from the same period last year.
The Wink data also shows sales leaders by distribution channel. Great American Insurance Group was the leader within the bank channel, while CNO Companies led the career agent channel. Athene USA took the top spot in the independent agent channel, snatching that title from Allianz Life. However, Allianz Life continued to lead within the independent broker dealer channel. Global Atlantic Financial Group was the market leader in the national broker dealer channel, passing Symetra Financial, the sales leader within that channel for the first quarter.
Jackson National Life Maintains Top Spot in Fixed Annuity Sales
Within fixed annuities, momentum continues for Jackson National Life, which maintained a dominant market position with 14.4% of sales. Modern Woodmen of America maintained its second-ranked position this quarter, followed again by Great American Insurance Group. Global Atlantic Financial Group and Reliance Standard flipped spots, with Global Atlantic taking the fourth spot this quarter.
Forethought Life’s ForeCare Fixed Annuity was the top-selling fixed annuity during the quarter.
Total fixed annuity sales slipped 7% during the quarter to just over $10 billion. That figure represents a nearly 39% drop from the same period in 2016.
Great American was the market leader in the bank channel, while Modern Woodmen of America held the top spot in the career agent channel. Jackson National Life was the sales leader among independent agents and Brighthouse Financial led within the independent broker dealer channel. Global Atlantic Financial Group held the dominant position within the national broker dealer channel. The only change in sales leaders among channels was in the career agent channel, where Foresters Financial led last quarter.
New York Life Leads Multi-Year Guaranteed Annuities Category
New York Life ranked as the top carrier in multi-year guaranteed annuity sales, with a market share of 21.8%. Global Atlantic was second, followed by AIG, Delaware Life and Symetra Financial. Security Benefit Life, which ranked fifth in the first quarter, dropped out of the top five in the second quarter, replaced by Delaware Life. Forethoughts SecureFore 3 Fixed Annuity was the top-selling product within the category.
Multi-year guaranteed annuity sales dropped 12.4% in the quarter to $7.8 billion. That represents an 11% decline from the same period last year.
New York Life was the sales leader within both the career agent and national broker dealer channels. Global Atlantic Financial Group was the leader within the bank channel, while American National led within the independent agent channel. Global Atlantic Financial Group was the market leader in the independent broker dealer channel.