PRU.L - Prudential plc
| Previous close | 1,430.00 |
| Open | 1,430.50 |
| Bid | 1,410.00 x 0 |
| Ask | 1,480.00 x 0 |
| Day's range | 1,412.75 - 1,448.50 |
| 52-week range | 1,325.00 - 1,819.50 |
| Volume | 7,058,158 |
| Avg. volume | 4,949,779 |
| Market cap | 36.8B |
| Beta (3Y monthly) | 1.00 |
| PE ratio (TTM) | 11.46 |
| EPS (TTM) | 123.50 |
| Earnings date | N/A |
| Forward dividend & yield | 0.50 (3.51%) |
| Ex-dividend date | 2019-08-22 |
| 1y target est | 2,079.18 |
- Fool.co.uk
3 top FTSE 100 dividend stocks I’d buy for 2020
Roland Head highlights his top three FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) income stocks for the next decade.
- Reuters - UK Focus
CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-UK judge blocks $15 bln transfer of Prudential annuities to Rothesay Life
A UK High Court judge has blocked the transfer of 12 billion pounds ($15 billion) in annuities from insurer Prudential to Rothesay Life, the two companies said on Friday. The deal, which would have been the largest ever such transfer covering 400,000 policy holders, was announced in March last year at the same time Prudential said it was to demerge its UK business. In response to tougher European Union rules introduced after the financial crisis, insurers have increasingly looked to free up capital by offloading closed books of annuity business to specialist firms such as Rothesay and Phoenix Group.
- Reuters
UK judge blocks £12 billion transfer of Prudential annuities to Rothesay Life
A UK High Court judge has blocked the transfer of 12 billion pounds in annuities from insurer Prudential to Rothesay Life, the two companies said on Friday. The deal, which would have been the largest ever such transfer covering 400,000 policy holders, was announced in March last year at the same time Prudential said it was to demerge its UK business. In response to tougher European Union rules introduced after the financial crisis, insurers have increasingly looked to free up capital by offloading closed books of annuity business to specialist firms such as Rothesay and Phoenix Group.
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 2-UK shares bag gains after delayed stock market open
The main index rose 0.7% with all sectors in the black, while the FTSE 250 index outperformed with a 1% rise owing to gains in the local currency. The outage, which was the longest in eight years and delayed trading for almost two hours, came during a volatile week for global financial markets, which were hit by worries about an impending recession and a prolonged U.S.-China trade spat. The FTSE 100's weekly run, which had dragged the index to six-month lows at one point, has placed it on course for its worst month in nearly four years.
- Fool.co.uk
Does the recent market drop make these 2 shares too cheap to ignore?
Could these FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) stocks be absolute bargains now? Andy Ross takes a look at two companies that have caught his eye.
- Fool.co.uk
Forget the RBS share price. I’d back this other blue-chip to smash the FTSE 100
G A Chester explains why he's avoiding Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc (LON:RBS) but considering buying another FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE:UKX) stock.
- Business Wire
Jackson Reports First Half 2019 Financial Results1
Company generates record pre-tax operating income of $1.6 billion; remits $525 million dividend to parent company
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 2-Prudential to split by year-end; monitoring Hong Kong protests
Britain's biggest insurer Prudential will complete a planned break-up of the company by the end of the year, with its UK-focused fund and insurance business set to list as M&G Plc. The Asia and U.S.-focused rump of the company will continue to trade as Prudential and be listed in the UK, but will be subject to the regulator in Hong Kong - where Prudential said it was "carefully monitoring" current violent protests in the city. "We expect to complete the demerger of M&GPrudential in the fourth quarter of 2019, and preparations are complete for Prudential Plc's move to group-wide supervision by the Hong Kong Insurance Authority," Chief Executive Mike Wells said in a statement.
- Reuters
Prudential to split by year-end; monitoring Hong Kong protests
Britain's biggest insurer Prudential will complete a planned break-up of the company by the end of the year, with its UK-focused fund and insurance business set to list as M&G Plc. The Asia and U.S.-focused rump of the company will continue to trade as Prudential and be listed in the UK, but will be subject to the regulator in Hong Kong - where Prudential said it was "carefully monitoring" current violent protests in the city. "We expect to complete the demerger of M&GPrudential in the fourth quarter of 2019, and preparations are complete for Prudential Plc's move to group-wide supervision by the Hong Kong Insurance Authority," Chief Executive Mike Wells said in a statement.
- Reuters - UK Focus
Prudential H1 operating profit up 14%; to demerge in Q4
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 3-FTSE 100 sinks to two month low on recession fears
Britain's FTSE 100 tumbled to its lowest in more than two months on Wednesday after the yields on 10-year U.S. and UK government bonds fell below two-year equivalents for the first time since the financial crisis, signalling mounting fears of recession. The FTSE 100 index, already under pressure from weak Chinese economic data, ended down 1.4%, with losses across all but one sector.
- Simply Wall St.
How Do Analysts See Prudential plc (LON:PRU) Performing In The Next Couple Of Years?
The latest earnings update Prudential plc (LON:PRU) released in March 2019 confirmed that the company benefited from a...
- Fool.co.uk
A FTSE 100 dividend stock I’d buy while investors panic over trade wars
This FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) dividend stock has tanked since Donald Trump spoke of more trade tariffs last week. Edward Sheldon believes it's a bargain.
- Business Wire
Prudential Retirement announces a new reinsurance counterparty, bringing its support to insurers that make up over 90% of UK pension risk transfer market
Prudential Retirement®, a business unit of Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE: PRU), and The Phoenix Group, Europe’s largest life and pensions consolidator and one of the fastest-growing providers of life and pension insurance in the United Kingdom, have entered into an inaugural longevity reinsurance agreement covering U.K. retirees. “We are excited to be working together with Phoenix,” said Christian Ercole, vice president, Longevity Risk Transfer and transaction lead for the Phoenix deal.
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 1-British insurer Aviva looking to sell Asia business - sources
HONG KONG/LONDON, Aug 1 (Reuters) - British life and general insurer Aviva is looking to sell its Asia business, valuing the unit at more than $2 billion, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. Aviva is working with a financial adviser on a possible sale, with a formal process likely to begin in the fourth quarter, the sources said. There is no certainty of a sale, which will depend on the outcome of a review of the Asian business to be completed by the end of this quarter, the sources said.
- Bloomberg
Bill Gates and Former Bass Guitarist Aim to Change Health Care
(Bloomberg) -- Jonathan Sudharta was a brawl-prone, unremarkable student who played in a rock band. Friends of his father, a self-made tycoon, feared he’d one day take over the family medical business and ruin it.Instead, in 2016, at the age of 34, Sudharta co-founded a startup that attracted the interest of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and today becomes the organization’s first ever equity investment in an online health-care platform.His creation, Halodoc, is trying to address one of the biggest problems in medicine: In a world with too few doctors and hundreds of millions of people without proper access to clinics, how can people get the diagnosis and drugs they need quickly and cheaply?“Someone is going to solve patient-centric, 21st century, primary health care and we think that Halodoc has a huge potential to do that,” said David Rossow, London-based founding partner of the Gates Foundation’s Strategic Investment Fund.Microsoft Corp.’s co-founder has invested heavily to fight specific diseases, including a pledge of $1 billion to end malaria. Yet the challenge for much of the developing world is how to get health care day to day, not just for a single illness. About 40 million people use Halodoc’s app or website to connect with more than 22,000 licensed doctors in Indonesia for an online consultation. Sudharta said in an interview he is aiming to expand that by 2020 to 100 million people -- more than one in three Indonesians. Once they have a diagnosis, patients can buy medicine through the app from one of more than 1,000 pharmacies and get it speedily delivered by motorcycle or scooter.Halodoc, valued at about $350 million according to people familiar with its accounts, also offers home blood and urine tests by a visiting medical attendant, with the result sent via the app. Patients can use the website if needed to book face-to-face appointments with a doctor at a hospital.Few places could get more benefit from a new mobile-based health care system than Indonesia. With a population of 260 million spread across more than 17,000 islands, it has only two physicians for every 10,000 people, behind the 8 in India, and 26 in the U.S., according to the World Bank.Despite efforts by the government, infrastructure and services remain largely overwhelmed, with traffic snarls in major cities like Jakarta and public facilities often operating beyond capacity. People can make a living by queuing for others.A 20-minute drive from Halodoc’s offices, in the Apotik Mahakam pharmacy, customers are either elderly or deliverymen waiting to whisk orders on scooters through the narrow alleys and clogged arteries of the capital. Even with peak-hour traffic crawling at an average 6.2 miles an hour, Halodoc customers can get their pills in a little over half an hour.In the nerve center of the Halodoc operation in central Jakarta one morning this month, some 400 young employees worked in the kind of featureless, chaotic, laptop-filled rooms that are the hallmark of a tech startup. Men in T-shirts and women in headscarves tapped away at keyboards, surrounded by piles of cardboard boxes, medicine delivery bags, flipcharts and stacks of bubble-wrapped chairs that were awaiting a move to larger premises. Below a giant pinboard of staff photos, an unused ping-pong table presented a plateful of snacks.In the next room, half a dozen doctors in white coats sat round a table diagnosing the populace via laptops and mobile phones.The face of a young man with round spectacles and a scar on his right cheek appeared on the phone of Dr. Alia Kusuma, one of the front line GPs. He had fallen from his motorcycle a month ago and was worried about the lasting effect. After a short consultation, Kusuma referred him to a laser treatment specialist.Across the table, Dr. Devi Anneta was following up on the progress of a 51-year-old man who had been hospitalized for high cholesterol, hypertension and joint problems.Halodoc covers the cost of the medical advice from its capital and from commissions on drug sales, lab tests and hospital referrals. A prominent, crossed-out label on the app shows that it will eventually charge upwards of 20,000 rupiah ($1.40) per consultation.Halodoc’s rise reflects the pace of change in Indonesia, the world’s fastest-growing internet economy. Sudharta’s father founded a pharmaceutical materials trading house in 1975 that’s now called Mensa Group and has businesses from making drug ingredients to supplying medical equipment to hospitals. The conglomerate gave the young Sudharta connections to doctors, hospitals and pharmacies, and contacts at the health regulator with whom he could discuss new ideas. While his father’s company didn’t fund Halodoc directly, the startup rents offices in one of Mensa’s buildings.One of Sudharta’s early encounters with medical care was at 13, when he and some school friends got into a fight with kids at a senior school and were beaten mercilessly. The pugilistic boy was sent to the prestigious Hale School in Perth, Australia, before studying commerce at Curtin University, filling the time by playing bass in a band and producing films and concerts for Indonesian diaspora.Back in Indonesia he joined his father’s firm as a trainee, and was sent on his first day to the port with a stack of cash. His job was to hand out a 1,000 rupiah note bonus (about 10 U.S. cents) to each worker carrying a load of shipment.He was upset to see an elderly worker carrying a heavy load, and wanted to give him 5,000 rupiah, but the manager stopped him, saying his action would be detrimental for the company. When the old man wholeheartedly thanked him for the tiny tip, Sudharta realized how privileged he was. He vowed never to take it for granted again.“It was a big slap in my face,” Sudharta, now 37, said in a conference room with a broken red sofa in Halodoc’s offices in Jakarta. “That changed my life.”He went to see Ferry Soetikno, a successful second-generation scion who had expanded his family’s health-care business, PT Dexa Medica. Soetikno, 12 years his senior, told him: focus, start from the beginning and always measure your performance.Sudharta adopted the pseudonym Budi Jonathan to hide his identity and began as a junior medical representative at Mensa, often waiting until past midnight for a chance to pitch drugs to overworked doctors. Over the next 13 years he rose through the company ranks.He didn’t think of starting his own medical business, but would talk to friends about the gaps he saw in Indonesia’s system. One of those friends, Gojek co-founder Nadiem Makarim, pulled him aside one day and said: “‘Why don’t you do it yourself? A startup. Fundraise. Do it properly.’”Gojek, Indonesia’s answer to Uber Technologies Inc., went on to become the country’s most valuable startup, with ride-hailing, food delivery and payments services across the country and now spreading elsewhere in Southeast Asia. It also became a key strategic backer for Halodoc, integrating the app in 2017 into its platform.Makarim’s advice was to focus on helping people where they felt the greatest pain, and Sudharta thought of the countless times he’d seen patients camped out in hospitals to see a doctor for a few minutes and then wait another two hours to get medicine.A year after Halodoc started, Sudharta had another pivotal introduction when he was part of a group of young leaders invited to a lunch with Bill Gates in Seattle. The invitees were asked to dress formally. Sudharta arrived in a business shirt, but removed it just before the meeting with Gates to reveal a red T-shirt emblazoned with Halodoc’s logo.Sudharta left the meeting with the message that if you’re lucky enough to be able to change the world, do good, stay on course and don’t get distracted by the financial rewards.Meanwhile, the Gates’ foundation, which distributes billions of dollars in grants to improve living conditions in developing countries, had been increasingly looking to make direct investments in companies that could help advance its goals. One of its target countries was Indonesia and the investment arm zeroed in on Halodoc.The foundation is joining Halodoc’s so-called extended Series B round of funding with other new contributors Prudential Plc and Allianz SE. They will add to the $65 million Halodoc secured from UOB Venture Management, Singtel Innov8 and Korea Investment Partners in March. Halodoc is only one of dozens of health-tech startups developing apps. Gojek rival Grab has a joint venture with China’s Ping An Good Doctor to provide online services in Southeast Asia, while Indonesian rivals include Alodoktor.What helps Halodoc stand out is the breadth of Sudharta’s vision to cover all aspects of the patient’s experience, all wrapped together with digital payment, said Shane Chesson, founding partner at Singapore-based Openspace Ventures and an early backer of Halodoc.“In rapid time, Haldoc has moved to be one of the best at product development in Indonesia,” he said. For the Gates Foundation, Halodoc is part of its belief that technology can improve access to quality health-care for low-income groups, said the strategic investment fund’s Rossow.“Whether it’s a midwife on a remote island or a pharmacy in a major city or a hospital system, Halodoc’s approach of closing that online-to-offline loop is rare,” he said. “There is huge opportunity for Indonesia to lead the world with some of these innovations.”To contact the authors of this story: Yoolim Lee in Singapore at yoolim@bloomberg.netDavid Ramli in Singapore at dramli1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Adam Majendie at adammajendie@bloomberg.net, Peter ElstromFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Fool.co.uk
Two FTSE 100 stocks I’d add to my dividend portfolio today
These two FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) dividend stocks are priced to buy, says Edward Sheldon.
- Business Wire
Jackson Enhances Variable Annuity Benefit Suite, Adds Fidelity to Money Manager Roster
Jackson National Life Insurance Company® (Jackson®) today announced several benefit updates to its family of variable annuities (VAs), including Perspective II and Perspective Advisory II. As part of this launch, Jackson introduced LifeGuard Freedom Accelerator and Accelerator DB — two new benefits available through the Perspective family of VAs. LifeGuard Freedom Accelerator provides the potential for consumers to grow their income by offering higher levels of guaranteed withdrawals for each year they defer taking income.
- Bloomberg
Prudential Vies With FWD for Vietcombank Insurance Deal
(Bloomberg) -- Prudential Plc is vying with Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li’s FWD Group to become an insurance-distribution partner of Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam JSC, the nation’s biggest lender by market value, according to people familiar with the matter.Prudential and FWD are among firms seeking to gain exclusive rights to distribute life insurance products through Vietcombank’s branch network, said the people, asking not to be identified because the matter is private. Vietcombank is expected to receive an initial payment of about $400 million and could get more based on the performance of the business, the people said.Credit Suisse Group AG has been advising Vietcombank on finding a new insurance-distribution partner, Bloomberg News first reported in June last year. A deal could be worth as much as $1 billion over the life of the contract, depending on how it is structured, the people said at the time.Negotiations are still ongoing and no final decision has been made, the people said. Other bidders could still emerge, they said. Representatives for Prudential, FWD and Vietcombank declined to comment.Insurers have been attracted to a growing middle class in Vietnam. Bank for Investment & Development of Vietnam is also exploring selling its stake in a life insurance joint venture with MetLife Inc., other people with knowledge of the matter have said.Hanoi-based Vietcombank employs more than 15,000 staff, with over 500 outlets in the country’s capital and aboard, according to its website. In 2007, the bank formed a joint venture with BNP Paribas SA’s life insurance unit Cardif and Vietnamese lender SeABank to develop insurance products. Vietcombank has set a goal to become the nation’s No. 1 bank in 2020, its website shows.\--With assistance from Bei Hu.To contact the reporters on this story: Joyce Koh in Singapore at jkoh38@bloomberg.net;Manuel Baigorri in Hong Kong at mbaigorri@bloomberg.net;Nguyen Dieu Tu Uyen in Hanoi at uyen1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Fion Li at fli59@bloomberg.net, Katrina NicholasFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Fool.co.uk
These 3 FTSE 100 dividend stocks could boom in August. Can you afford to ignore them?
Royston Wild looks at a few FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) shares that could fly next month. Are they great ways to bolster your income flows?
- Simply Wall St.
Does Prudential plc (LON:PRU) Create Value For Shareholders?
While some investors are already well versed in financial metrics (hat tip), this article is for those who would like...
- Fool.co.uk
Would I buy shares in Aviva for my Stocks and Shares ISA now?
Andy Ross looks at whether changes at FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) insurer Aviva plc (LON: AV) could reward shareholders.
- Reuters
Insurer Prudential says M&GPrudential's cost savings on track
M&GPrudential was formed in 2017 by the merger of asset manager M&G and Prudential's UK and Europe insurance operations. "Profitable growth prospects for M&GPrudential are substantial," Prudential said in a statement ahead of M&GPrudential's investor and analyst conference.
- Bloomberg
Prudential CEO Wells on 'Pulse' Health App, Asia Strategy
Aug.07 -- Prudential PLC Chief Executive Officer Michael Wells discusses the U.K. insurer's new 'Pulse' digital health app it's introducing in Malaysia, and the company's strategy for the Asia. He speaks with Paul Allen and Sophie Kamaruddin on "Bloomberg Daybreak: Asia."
