Assured Guaranty Ltd. Message Board

Sorry pmlljl, I was just kidding. It just seemed ironic that the day that you posted about squeezing the shorts was the day we had our best more in probably a month.

Nice day for NWLI today - must have been pmlljl's threat to go after the shorts!

You have 2 issues here:

1. You can't really compare a P&C company with a life company in the current environment. Life companies are perceived as much more risky due to the longer duration of their obligations and the reinvestment risk on existing policies. Because P&C pricing can be adjusted much more quickly. Look at even major life companies like MET which are also trading a very low valuation metrics

2. ANAT pays a yield and NWLI (almost) does not. In the current environment where so many people are looking for yield, ANAT will be much more attractive. In the market in general, if you compare 2 equivalent companies valuation wise, 1 with yield, 1 without, the one with yield is getting a much better valuation.

If you believe that interest rates normalize over time, life companies are much better opportunities. On the other hand, if you think the US is turning into Japan, probably the P&C companies do better over the next few years.

The other thing is She’s only acting commissioner, nominated to be commissioner, and she is not popular w/ the Democrats and some Republicans, unlikely to be confirmed.

Looks like it cut off the bottom of the article. Perhaps it is because you are posting large posts you are getting these problems?

Thanks for the link Ben. it is hard to believe that a Texas Insurance Commissioner would out a local company out of business because of an argument with the Brazil government, especially when the Moody's have so much business in Texas and there are no political points to be scored. Still, even though I am pretty sure NWLI is okay here, I've certainly seen it go the other way - for example, an indemnification clause protecting the seller of an asset in contract getting turned over by the courts. Hopefully, she just moves onto something else fairly quickly.

What browser are you using? I find sometimes Chrome works and sometimes Internet Explorer works with Yahoo Message boards lately.

Nice report, well presents the story, but I'd say you are being conservative in your targets. NWLI traded above 80% of book a lot of time in the good markets of the 1990's and also in the 2003 - 2007 period. I don't see why is couldn't do this again.

At current values, that would put the share price around $300, on say $25 of earnings, that's only a P/E of 12. Pretty reasonable for a safe stock which is growing it's value consistently.

Great win. Not sure of how long the project is, but if they can be successful here, could open the doors for a lot of revenues in China.

That's a surprisingly high short interest. When I check the other lifeco's, they don't seem to have the same levels. Plus, you know it is real shorts, not hedging against options as NWLI doesn't trade options.

Not sure why people would be so aggressive against such a well-capitalized, profitable lifeco. Perhaps because the dividend is so low, it is a cheap way to bet against the overall life insurance industry, but still, anyone who did any due diligence would see this is not another HIG.

Hope you are right. It's been my largest position for over a year now. I'm very confident it works out, but didn't see a catalyst. I thought it's been earnings, but perhaps you are right on the fund selling.

Anyhow, looks like NWLI is moving now. Most of the lifeco's seem top be responding well to the rise interest rates - MET at a 52 week high for example.

Yeah. Been having problems lately too. Looks like Marissa Mayer is making some chancres which is great, but a few bugs I guess. I find I can post OK if I flip to internet explorer instead though.

The way I look at this is with NWLI, you have the opportunity to buy a company, that increases the value of your investment by 20% a year, plus you are buying it for less than half price, so you've got great downside protection.

In a good market like 2006 or 2007, someone will be willing to pay full price for this, so I can just wait, have the value of my investment grow by 20% a year and at some point, cash out both the 50% discount on purchase price plus the 20% annual growth I received.

If you take the increase in book value for the year and divide that by the current stock price, you get a return of almost 20%. That is outstanding and hard to see it will last in a conservative investment (although I've thought this for a couple of years now).