AFL, Aflac Inc
Read top to bottom, the owner's questions in the order an owner asks them: what the business is, whether the record holds, whether it survives and is any good, and what you would be paying. New to the questions? Start with the Method.
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, read from the numbers in its filings. The quantitative detail is in the sections below; the verdict is left to you.
- What it is
- An insurance business, read on its underwriting result, the combined ratio, and the float it invests, rather than an earnings multiple.
- What moves the needle
- Underwriting discipline and the float. What decides it: whether the combined ratio stays below 100% so the policies make money on their own, how large the float is against equity, and what that float earns once it is invested.
- Is it a good business?
- It underwrites at a profit, about a 93% combined ratio (it keeps roughly 7% of premiums before investing the float). Book value per share, the measure Berkshire is judged on, has compounded about 9% a year across the record. The float runs about 2.1× equity, the leverage that magnifies both the underwriting and the investing. Whether the discipline holds through a soft market, and how the float is invested, are what the 10-K decides.
Every line here is arithmetic from the company's own filings, not a model's opinion, and each figure appears in full in the sections below.
The record, 2016–2025
realized figures from each filing, no estimates| 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RevenueRevenue | $22.6B | $21.7B | $21.8B | $22.3B | $22.1B | $21.6B | $19.1B | $18.7B | $18.9B | $17.2B | $18.1B |
| Premiums earnedPremiums | $19.2B | $18.5B | $18.7B | $18.8B | $18.6B | $17.1B | $14.9B | $14.1B | $13.4B | $13.5B | $13.5B |
| Net incomeNet inc. | $2.7B | $4.6B | $2.9B | $3.3B | $4.8B | $4.2B | $4.4B | $4.7B | $5.4B | $3.6B | $4.6B |
| Combined ratioCombined | ≈ 96% | ≈ 95% | ≈ 95% | ≈ 95% | ≈ 97% | ≈ 96% | ≈ 96% | ≈ 95% | ≈ 93% | ≈ 93% | ≈ 93% |
| Loss ratioLoss | 67% | 66% | 64% | 64% | 63% | 61% | 60% | 58% | 55% | 54% | 53% |
| Return on equityROE | 13% | 19% | 12% | 11% | 14% | 25% | 22% | 21% | 21% | 12% | 15% |
| Investment incomeInv. inc. | $3.3B | $3.2B | $3.4B | $3.6B | $3.6B | $3.8B | $3.7B | $3.8B | $4.1B | $4.1B | $4.1B |
| Float (reserves)Float | $4.0B | $4.4B | $4.6B | $4.7B | $5.2B | $4.8B | $4.6B | $83.7B | $70.4B | $62.3B | $59.5B |
| Book value / shareBVPS | $24.74 | $30.83 | $30.29 | $38.80 | $46.86 | $25.17 | $31.58 | $36.72 | $46.19 | $55.13 | $58.20 |
| Dividends / shareDiv/sh | $0.79 | $0.83 | $1.02 | $1.03 | $1.07 | $1.26 | $1.54 | $1.61 | $1.92 | $2.24 | — |
Owner’s Scorecard
Is it a good business?
- Combined ratio ≈ 93%Underwriting profitTotal benefits, losses and expenses $12.6B ÷ premiums earned $13.5B
The heart of an insurer: claims and costs as a share of premiums. Below 100% means it is paid to hold the float, the gold standard; above 100% means it loses money on the policies and must make it back on investments. Approximate here, taken from the filer's total benefits, losses and expenses over premiums, so it can sit a point or two off the company's headline figure; a number held below 100% across cycles is the mark of a disciplined underwriter, the rarest thing in the business.
- Return on equity 12%SolidNet income $3.6B ÷ equity $29.5B
What it earns on shareholders' capital, the underwriting result plus what the float earns invested. Durably above the ~10% cost of equity is what compounds book value.
The float
- Float (reserves) $62.3B2.1× equityLoss and claim reserves $62.3B, 2.1× equity
Money collected as premiums and held against future claims, invested in the meantime. Buffett's insight was that good underwriting makes this float cost less than nothing, a pool of other people's money the owners earn on. The larger it is against equity, the more that leverage works, for better or worse.
- Investment income $4.1B6.5% on the floatNet investment income $4.1B, 6.5% on the float
What the float and capital earned this year. This is the second engine: an insurer that breaks even on underwriting still wins if the float is large and invested well.
Solvent is not the same as cheap; growing is not the same as good. These are vital signs, not a verdict, the judgment is yours, and the filing is one click away.
Management & pay
read the proxy →Two questions Buffett actually asks about pay: is stock compensation, a real expense, whatever the income statement pretends, quietly large, and is the top wildly out of line with the floor. He's no populist about it; he just wants pay that's rational and earned, and comp committees that aren't lapdogs.
- CEO pay ratio396:1
What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2026 proxy. A high ratio isn't proof of anything, some businesses are genuinely top-heavy in scarce skill, but a runaway figure is where Buffett starts asking whether the board is doing its job or just keeping the chair company.
What the price implies
price / tangible bookAn insurer is worth a multiple of its tangible book value, and the multiple it deserves is set by the return it earns on that book. Type today’s price; we show what you would be paying against what Aflac Inc’s record justifies. Nothing is stored; the number stays in your browser.
Enter a price above to run it.
The justified multiple is (return on tangible equity − growth) ÷ (cost of equity − growth). An insurer earning exactly its cost of equity is worth about one times tangible book; every point of durable excess return above that is worth paying up for. Raise the cost of equity and the justified multiple falls: that is interest-rate gravity on an insurer.
Tangible book $29.7B on 515M shares, a 14% normalized return on it. This is a lens, not a target. It assumes the insurer keeps earning that return; an underwriting cycle, a reserve shortfall or a bad year on the float changes it, which is what the record and the 10-K are for.
What the filing emphasizes, FY2025
read the 10-K →Each year a 10-K must name what could go wrong, in the company's own words. Here are the ones Graham and Buffett would stop on, each set against the figure from the same filings that bears on it, anchored to a period you can find in the record above. We point; the judgment is yours.
- Debt terms & refinancingRisk Factors
The fine print behind the debt. Covenants and near-term maturities decide who is really in control when a year goes badly.
“This includes a thorough analysis of a variety of items including the issuer's country of domicile (including political, legal, and financial considerations); the industry in which the issuer competes (with an analysis of industry structure, end-market dynamics, and regulation); company specific iss…”
From the recordBalance sheet (TTM)$2.2B modest net debt · interest covered 21.3× - Litigation & contingenciesRisk Factors
Claims an owner inherits. Most disclosure is boilerplate; this fires only on an actual matter, a named suit, a settlement, a contingency, a number.
“The Company is a defendant in various lawsuits and receives various regulatory inquiries considered to be in the normal course of business.”
A judgment, not a number, weigh it against the filing yourself. - Regulation & policyRisk Factors
Rules that can rewrite the economics, tariffs, antitrust, data, export controls.
“Income Taxes Income tax provisions are generally based on pretax earnings reported for financial statement purposes, which differ from those amounts used in preparing the Company's income tax returns.”
A judgment, not a number, weigh it against the filing yourself.
What changed, FY2025 vs FY2024
read the 10-K →Most of a 10-K is boilerplate carried over verbatim; the signal is in what's new. These lines appear this year and weren't there last, figure updates filtered out, so only the language shift remains.
- “In Yen (In millions of dollars and billions of yen) 2025 2024 2025 2024 New annualized premium sales $ 498 $ 422 74.4 64.1 Increase (decrease) over prior period 18.1 % (2.2) % 16.0 % 5.6 % In 2025, the increase in new annualized premium sales on a Japanese yen basis was driven primarily by continued…”
- “In 2025, operating results in Japanese yen terms compared to the previous year were as follows: Net earned premiums decreased primarily due to approximately 21 billion related to the internal cancer reinsurance transaction with Aflac Re established in the fourth quarter of 2024 and approximately 15 …”
- “Total benefits and claims decreased primarily due to 68 billion of reserve remeasurement gains related to assumption updates in the third quarter of 2025, compared to reserve remeasurement gains of approximately 50 billion in the third quarter of 2024, as well as the internal cancer reinsurance tran…”
- “In December 2025, the Company completed a detailed review of the potentially impacted files and determined that personal information associated with approximately 22.65 million individuals was involved, and began notifying impacted individuals and regulatory authorities as required by applicable law…”
- “ASU 2023-07 Segment Reporting (Topic 280) - Improvements to Reportable Segment Disclosures In November 2023, the FASB issued amendments that add certain segment disclosures related to significant segment expenses and require that a public entity disclose the title and position of the Chief Operating…”
Classic text analysis over the filing itself, no model wrote a word of this, and every quote is the company's own.
Peers, Health insurance
The same industry, side by side on the underwriting lens, compare, don't rank by a single number.● marks best in the group.
| Company | Revenue | Combined ratio | Loss ratio | ROE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UNHUnitedhealth Group Incorporated | $447.6B | — | 89% | 12% |
| CIThe Cigna Group | $274.9B | — | 85% | 14% |
| ELVElevance Health, Inc. | $199.1B | 117% | 90% | 13% |
| CNCCentene Corporation | $174.6B | — | 364% | -33% |
| HUMHumana Inc | $129.7B | 103% | 90% | 7% |
| AFLAflac Inc | $17.2B | 93% | 54% | 12% |