A.M. Best Affirms Ratings of Centurion Life Insurance Company and Centurion Casualty Company; Assigns Issuer Credit Rating.OLDWICK, N.J. -- A.M. Best Co. has affirmed the financial strength rating (FSR (Free System Resource) In Windows 3.x, the amount of unused memory in various 64K blocks reserved for managing current applications. Every open window takes some space in this area. See Windows memory limitation. ) of A (Excellent) and issuer credit rating (ICR (Intelligent Character Recognition or Image Character Recognition) The machine recognition of hand-printed characters as well as machine printing that is difficult to recognize. ) of "a" of Centurion Life Insurance Company (CLIC CLIC Centre Local d'Information et de Coordination (French) CLiC Climate and Cryosphere (World Climate Research Programme project, Norway) CLIC Compact Linear Collider CLIC Connecticut Licensing Information Center ) (Des Moines, IA), a subsidiary of Wells Fargo Financial, Inc. (WFF WFF Wallops Flight Facility WFF Well-Formed Formula WFF With Full Force (German music festival) WFF Women's Foodservice Forum WFF Wee Forest Folk WFF World Fitness Federation WFF Wildlife Foundation of Florida WFF Warm Fuzzy Feeling ), whose ultimate parent is Wells Fargo & Co. (San Francisco) [NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange : WFC]. Concurrently, A.M. Best has affirmed the FSR of A- (Excellent) and assigned an ICR of "a-" to Centurion Casualty Company (CCC CCC A very speculative grade assigned to a debt obligation by a rating agency. Such a rating indicates default or considerable doubt that interest will be paid or principal repaid. Also called Caa. ) (Des Moines, IA), a wholly owned subsidiary Wholly Owned Subsidiary A subsidiary whose parent company owns 100% of its common stock. Notes: In other words, the parent company owns the company outright and there are no minority owners. of Wells Fargo Financial Bank, also a subsidiary of WFF. The outlook for all ratings is stable. The ratings of CLIC reflect its excellent risk-adjusted capital position, positive operating results and recent--albeit modest--growth in new annuity business. CLIC has experienced a general decline in credit insurance business but has maintained solid profitability due to its low cost operation and favorable loss experience. Partially offsetting these strengths are the company's limited business profile, traditional mono-line credit insurance product focus and challenges of growing its market position in the highly competitive fixed annuity business. The ratings of CCC recognize its solid capitalization, outstanding operating results and the benefits derived from its affiliation with WFF. Partially offsetting these positive rating factors are the decline in premium volume over the past five years, CCC's lack of product diversification, its dependency on the consumer finance operations of its parent, its extensive use of fronting and the strict regulatory oversight of the credit insurance industry. The rating outlook for both companies is based on A.M. Best's expectation that the companies' consistently positive operating performance will continue to drive strong organic surplus growth, supporting their excellent capitalization in the near term. For Best's Ratings, an overview of the rating process and rating methodologies, please visit www.ambest.com/ratings. Founded in 1899, A.M. Best Company is a full-service credit rating organization dedicated to serving the financial services industries, including the banking and insurance sectors. For more information, visit www.ambest.com. |
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