2Q26: EPS Beats on Specialty Benefits and IP Margins, but Net Outflows Persist

Research evidence excerpt

2Q26: EPS Beats on Specialty Benefits and IP Margins, but Net Outflows Persist

Equity Research

North America Insurance/Life

27 July 2026

Principal Financial Group

2Q26: EPS Beats on Specialty

Benefits and IP Margins, but Net

PFG UNDERWEIGHTOutflows Persist

Unchanged

Core operating EPS beats estimates on strong margin North America Insurance/ POSITIVE Life

Unchangedexecution, particularly in Specialty Benefits and International

Pension, but significant net outflows across businesses weigh Price Target USD 92.00 Unchanged

down results. Price (27-Jul-26) USD 111.29

Potential Upside/Downside -17.3%

PFG reported operating EPS of $2.50, beating our estimate of $2.25 and Street's estimate of Source: Bloomberg, Barclays Research

$2.33. After adjusting for slightly weaker alternatives, the company posted core EPS of $2.42 vs

our estimate of $2.31. The core earnings beat was primarily driven by strong loss ratio Market Cap (USD mn) 24040

improvement across products in Specialty Benefits and higher than expected NII in Shares Outstanding (mn) 216.01

International Pension. In RIS, pretax margin outperformance (41.5% vs our expected 40.1%) was Free Float (%) 98.85

partially offset by net outflows of $(3)bn (vs our expected $(1.2)bn). Within Asset Management, 52 Wk Avg Daily Volume (mn) 1.4

Investment Management delivered an inline earnings result due to substantial net outflows Dividend Yield (%) 3.02

offsetting robust expense discipline, while International Pension outperformed on higher than Return on Equity TTM (%) 13.56

expected NII. Benefits and Protection outperformance was anchored by favorable underwriting Current BVPS (USD) 54.59

across all product lines in Specialty Benefits, offset by slightly weaker underwriting Source: Bloomberg