See which workplaces made this year's list.

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Employees say:&nbsp;"The benefits are some of the best I have ever had, particularly the backup care and the tuition repayment assistance. From a work standpoint, I also love that my leader appreciates what I have to say and my ideas. I feel connected to and comfortable talking to my leader's leaders, because they have created an environment of openness and caring. There is buzz from my teammates all the way to my boss's boss's boss about the exciting things people are working on, and a connectivity between these levels that I have not experienced with other employers. I do not feel like a cog, I feel like what I do matters and I am excited to be part of my team."

Best Large Workplaces in Financial Services and Insurance

Fortune partnered with Great Place to Work to analyze survey feedback representing nearly 155,000 U.S. employees.

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Employees say:"I love the culture—volunteerism is really important here and I love that. I love the mindset my team has of working hard and performing quality work; but also have fun and be kind to each other, lead with compassion and understanding. Benefits are great, pay is competitive, and work life balance is real. I feel trusted and respected by my peers and leaders to use my judgment and make the right decisions for my customers. I truly enjoy working here."

Best Large Workplaces in New York

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Fortune 500

AI is a major force shaping this year’s list—but it’s far from the only story.

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Employees say:"I love the financial support from this company. This is my first employer where I feel like the company actually cares about the wellbeing of the employees with benefits like the student loan assistance, generous 401k match and pension plan. I also enjoy my department a lot and how many opportunities we get to be involved with larger projects, as well as opportunities to lead meetings to develop our leadership &amp; collaboration skills. The volunteer time is also a huge plus for me, it is nice to see the company want to give back."

Fortune partnered with Great Place to Work to analyze survey feedback representing nearly 145,000 U.S. employees.

Employees say:"I love Voya! This is the very best company I have ever worked for, and my loyalty will always be with them. My manager is amazing and supports my dreams here at Voya. Very encouraging and positive. I run to my computer every morning and it's a blessing in itself to work here! I'm proud to say I'm a Voya employee as they put the customer and employees first. We focus on teamwork and always keep the vision in mind. The benefits are phenomenal and I'm confident they give us all the tools we need to be successful. We also have additional training websites for those who want to grow in the organization at no cost! This is unheard of!"

Almost $20 trillion in revenue—and a record-breaking $1.87 trillion in profits. Introducing the 2025 Fortune 500, the definitive list of the biggest companies in America.

The 300 companies on this year’s list brought in over $12.6 trillion in revenue for the latest 12 months, with the median revenue figure at $22 billion.

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Employees say:"The support that this company gives women is incredible. Full access to programs like Maven truly shows how much the company cares for women and recognizes the need to provide additional support. Regardless on how difficult things might get at work, the support I have via Maven and other benefits help me to show up to work at my best. I also am a very big fan of the paid volunteer time - it is enough hours to feel that I truly can give back to my community and have a presence. It also allows me to set a great example to my children on social responsibility."

Best Large Workplaces for Parents

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Employees say:"We love to experiment with new ways of doing things. We strive for better efficiency and better experiences for both our customers and ourselves. The company recognizes that we are human and our experiences are vital to connecting with the people we partner with and service."

The companies on this annual list make a conscious effort to be supportive, inclusive workplaces.

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Employees say:"They create an atmosphere where all individuals are accepted for who they are, both in their professional lives and personal lives. Being honest about who you are, being open about who you are is a beautiful way to spend eight hours daily."

100 Best Large Workplaces for Women

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Employees say:"I feel the Voya Cares group is what makes Voya Financial unique in our industry. We really care about people with disabilities and special needs. This team makes a point to discuss this underserved group in our society and how we can look to help individuals and families with these certain circumstances plan for a better retirement future and have their companies help make this happen."

Fortune partnered with Great Place to Work to analyze survey feedback representing nearly 140,000 U.S. employees.

The Fortune 500, in its 70th year in 2024, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

Fortune partnered with Great Place to Work to analyze survey feedback representing nearly 100,000 U.S. employees.

GPTW New York 2023-Voya Financial_5003453-3

Employees say: 
 
"The Voya culture is exceptional and continuously reinforced, and the company is very successful. The leadership is extremely talented and visionary—the response to the pandemic was immediate and effective, and Voya has reiterated its commitment to offering a hybrid working environment and not enforcing a full return to the office. Combining forward-thinking business sense with compassion and disability and inclusion, Voya Cares® sets the company apart and seems to resonate with prospective clients as an appealing differentiator."

GPTW Financial Services & Insurance Large 2023-Voya Financial

Employees say: 
 
"The company has a history of giving back to the community, which really brings the employees together and makes you very proud to work for Voya Financial. I love that we can pick a cause to donate to and the company will match your donation. Also, the company gives you 40 hours a year to volunteer, which shows to really want their employees to participate in giving back to their communities—and not just with money but actually helping out."

The Fortune 500, in its 69th year in 2023, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

The companies on this year's list stand out for celebrating innovation, promoting cooperation, and more.

GPTW New York Large 2022-Voya Financial

Employees say: 
 
“I think their ability to adapt is unique. I feel this is a great place to work because in the pandemic and even now while things are getting better Voya is listening to their employees preference to where they would like to work from. They might prefer all employees return to the office, but I feel valued and heard because of the work from home opportunity they are giving.” 
 
Read the Great Place to Work review .

GPTW Financial Services Industry Large 2022-Voya Financial

Employees say: 
 
“There is a healthy culture here from the bottom to the top, you can count on others to operate within an inclusive, diverse culture and trust comes easier. I appreciate the opportunities to grow in my career and be my true self at work.”

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 68th running of the list.

These companies foster supportive cultures, where employees find opportunities for growth with help from their colleagues.

Best Large Workplaces New York 2021-Voya-Financial

Employees say: 
 
“Everyone here works hard and is always willing to go the extra mile for fellow employees and customers. Additionally, everyone is nice and enjoyable to work with, even when facing difficult challenges.”

The best workplaces in financial services and insurance acted as generous corporate citizens amid a year of multiple crises.

Best-Workplaces-Financial-Services-Large-2021-Voya-Financial

Employees say:  
“They've provided me with the means to have a career, care for my family, feel a sense of accomplishment, and so much more. From day one, I've been accepted fully and considered for promotions and advancement based on my skillset and work ethic.”

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 67th running of the list.

The American financial, retirement, investment, and insurance company is based in New York City and serves more than 14 million customers.

For an astounding 13th straight year, Apple claims the top spot in Fortune’s annual ranking of corporate reputation, based on a survey of almost 3,800 executives, directors, and analysts.

The 40 companies highlighted on this year's list support personal growth, outside-the-box thinking, and diversity in the workplace.

best workplaces new york 2020-Voya Financial

Employees say: 
 
"This job has allowed me to balance family life with work. Due to this job, I am allowed to still play a very active role in my children's life. I can be present during the first day of school or be part of school activities."

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 66th running of the list.

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The financial services company offers retirement savings plans, investment management, and life and employee benefit insurance to corporations and individuals.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 65th running of the list.

Here are the World's Most Admired Companies for 2018 as ranked in their industries. See who made the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 64th running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 63rd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 62nd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 61st running of the list. Wal-Mart claims the top spot again. See who made the list.

Best Workplaces For Women

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Best Workplaces In New York

Best Workplaces In Financial Services And Insurance

Getting workers ready for retirement is the focus of Voya Financial, which provides workplace benefits and savings solutions and technologies in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: wealth solutions, health solutions, and investment management. Voya serves some 39,000 U.S. employers and over 7 million individual retirement plan participants and has approximately 450 financial professionals serving retail and workplace clients. The company was formerly known as ING U.S. and changed its name to Voya Financial in April 2014. Voya Financial was founded in 1975.

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Voya Financial (VOYA): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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Voya Financial

voya financial

Good morning. Welcome to Voya Financial's third quarter 2026 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, please press star two. Participants are limited to one question and one follow-up question. Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Mei Ni Chu, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and thank you for joining today's call. We will begin with prepared remarks by Heather Lavallee, our Chief Executive Officer, and Mike Katz, our Chief Financial Officer. Following the prepared remarks, we will take your questions. Also joining the call are Jay Kaduson, CEO of Workplace Solutions, and Matt Toms, CEO of Investment Management. As a reminder, materials for today's call are available on our website at investors.voya.com. As noted on slide two of our analyst presentation, some of the comments during today's discussion may contain forward-looking statements and refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures within the meaning of federal securities law. GAAP reconciliations are available in our press release and financial supplement found on the Investor Relations website. I will turn the call over to Heather.

Thank you, Mei. Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. Let's turn to page four. We said we would deliver a strong second half, and our third quarter results demonstrate that we are delivering on that commitment. Adjusted operating earnings per share were $2.60, up 6% year-over-year. Commercial strength across the businesses drove fee revenue growth in Retirement and Investment Management, while continued improvements in Employee Benefits strengthened margins and cash generation. At the same time, we've taken deliberate steps to reshape our cost base and translate growth into stronger earnings, reinforcing our confidence as we enter the fourth quarter. Our third quarter results include additional severance costs tied to these actions. Beginning in the first quarter and into 2027, they will benefit our expense base, strengthen operating leverage, and support continued growth across the business.

We generated $225 million of excess capital this quarter, representing 95% of after-tax adjusted operating earnings. During the quarter, we returned approximately $150 million to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. We also increased our dividend by 21%. Let me turn to the business highlights. Across our businesses, we are delivering for our customers and executing on the strategic priorities that will drive future growth. Investments in automation and client experience, alongside disciplined expense management, are helping us to maintain and improve margins while growing the top line. Retirement is a scaled, high-margin, increasingly fee-based franchise that continues to strengthen its leadership position. We continue to see strong sales momentum across our target markets. Within full service, we are on pace to achieve sales growth of 15% in emerging markets, 20% in the mid-market, and more than 50% in government markets in 2026.

This quarter, we added nearly $14 billion of defined contribution net inflows and remain on track for a fifth consecutive year of positive net flows. Importantly, these results demonstrate the breadth of our growth. We are winning across employer segments, retaining clients, and generating substantial net inflows while creating more opportunities to connect our 10.3 million retirement participant accounts with advice and investment solutions through wealth management. We continue to generate strong commercial momentum and results in Investment Management. We are winning assets at attractive yields that together build scale and support robust fee revenue trends. Our institutional channel remains a key driver of growth, with strong demand from insurance clients for private fixed income capabilities. Year to date, the channel has generated $2.9 billion in net inflows. We are also seeing robust international retail flows into higher-fee, income-oriented solutions. Our access to international distribution remains an important competitive advantage.

Overall, the fundamentals of the business remain strong. We continue to see client demand in markets where our capabilities are most differentiated, and expense discipline is helping us sustain healthy operating margins as we continue to broaden our offering. In Employee Benefits, the steps we have taken on pricing, underwriting, and risk selection are driving margin improvement and increasing our confidence in further earnings growth. Stop Loss is a clear example of that progress. Over the past two years, we have taken decisive actions to improve the quality and consistency of the business, including disciplined pricing and greater selectivity in our underwriting. Those actions, together with a focused execution of our team, have directly contributed to improving loss ratios and more consistent margins in the 2026 book of business. Stop Loss demand remains strong as employers look for greater certainty around their healthcare costs.

At the same time, current market dynamics support disciplined pricing and enable us to remain selective in our underwriting. We see significant value in restoring profitability and building a more consistent earnings foundation, and we remain focused on returning loss ratios to the 77%-80% target range. These results reinforce our confidence in the fourth quarter and in the earnings trajectory of the company. I will now turn it over to Mike to walk through the financial results in more detail.

Thank you, Heather. Turning to slide six. This quarter demonstrates how strong business performance and continued productivity improvement are translating into earnings growth, robust cash generation, and greater capital flexibility. Third quarter adjusted operating earnings were $240 million, or $2.60 per diluted share. Adjusted operating earnings per share increased 6% year-over-year, or more than 14% excluding severance, driven by business performance and active share repurchases. We generated approximately $225 million of excess capital in the quarter. Our fourth quarter and 2027 earnings and cash flow outlook remain supported by business performance, expense management, and disciplined capital deployment. We are executing the efficiency work already underway across the enterprise to improve operating performance while aligning resources with our strategic priorities. Results this quarter include approximately $25 million of pre-tax severance expense associated with these actions.

As we guided last quarter, second half expenses are down meaningfully, and we now expect Retirement and Employee Benefits administrative expenses to be in the lower half of our guidance range. These actions are creating a more efficient cost structure while preserving capacity to reinvest in the business. Alternative investment returns were in line with our long-term expectations this quarter, benefiting from the timing of real estate gains. While we expect alternative investment returns to moderate in the near term, our sensitivity to alternatives is declining over time, and importantly, our overall earnings outlook remains strong. With that, let me turn to the segment results. Retirement benefits from scale and a growing fee base, supporting durable cash generation. in the quarter, we generated $266 million of adjusted operating earnings and $920 million over the last 12 months, both above the comparable prior year period.

Trailing 12-month earnings include a $35 million alternative investment income headwind, dampening otherwise strong underlying revenue and earnings growth tied to commercial momentum. Our fee-based revenues increased 12% over the trailing 12 months and now represent more than 60% of revenue. Operating margin was approximately 38%, reflecting our ability to create operating leverage while reinvesting in the business. We drove strong commercial momentum in the quarter with solid sales, high plan retention, and participant counts up 5% year-over-year. Defined contribution also benefited from a large plan implementation, which drove nearly $14 billion of net flows in the quarter. Large plan implementations are episodic, and we do not expect a similar contribution in the fourth quarter. As we communicated at the start of the year, we still expect positive organic net flows for 2026, with overall commercial momentum supporting revenue growth.

Overall, our scale, commercial momentum, and expense discipline position Retirement for continued profitable growth. Turning to Investment Management on slide eight. Investment Management is demonstrating the durability of the franchise with fee growth, healthy client demand, and strong long-term investment performance. Quarterly earnings were $58 million, compared with $62 million in the prior year period, primarily reflecting a $7 million reduction in investment capital income. The quality of our asset mix continued to support fee-based revenue growth, with operating margin at 28.6%. We generated commercial momentum across institutional, insurance, and international channels in the third quarter. Specifically, we attracted institutional client net inflows of $870 million in the quarter, contributing to over $3.5 billion over the last year, as insurance client demand for private fixed income capabilities remained high. In retail, demand for our income-oriented solutions improved, particularly from international clients.

As mentioned last quarter, retail included impacts from the wind-down of a legacy relationship. That was a $5 billion impact, which modestly offset momentum in actively distributed products, with a near-term revenue impact that is manageable. Our long-term investment performance remains strong, with more than 80% of assets outperforming benchmarks over the three-year period. Fee trends, healthy client demand, and long-term investment performance position the business for continued earnings momentum. Turning to Employee Benefits on slide nine. Our focus in Employee Benefits remains on improving margins through disciplined pricing and underwriting. Growing fee revenue from benefit administration and a more efficient cost structure are also strengthening the underlying business. Third quarter adjusted operating earnings were $51 million, including a $12 million net favorable impact from our annual actuarial assumption update, and $5 million of favorable development in Stop Loss.

For comparison, the prior year quarter included $6 million of favorable assumption updates and a $12 million Stop Loss reinsurance recovery. On a trailing 12-month basis, earnings more than doubled to $126 million. The assumption update also affected reported product loss ratios. Excluding the assumption impacts, the Group Life loss ratio was approximately 71%, reflecting favorable mortality, while Supplemental Health was 54%, consistent with expectations. As a reminder, Supplemental Health is a component of the broader reported voluntary, disability, and other loss ratio. In Stop Loss, the favorable reserve development reflects better-than-expected claims experience on our 2025 book. For the 2026 book, claims through October remain favorable relative to both 2024 and 2025, while reserves remain at the high end of our best estimate range. This is encouraging, although the experience is still developing.

For the January 2027 season, favorable market dynamics are supporting further meaningful rate increases, while higher RFP activity gives us greater opportunity to be selective and write business that meets our return targets. Taken together, our pricing and underwriting actions, improving claims experience, and more efficient cost structure support our fourth quarter outlook and position Employee Benefits for further margin improvement and earnings growth in 2027. Turning to slide 10. Strong earnings and cash generation are supporting our balance sheet and providing significant flexibility to invest for growth and return capital to shareholders. We expect to generate more than $800 million of excess capital in 2026, despite absorbing approximately $70 million of severance charges year to date. We expect free cash flow conversion to be at or above our 90% target.

Our 16.3% trailing 12-month adjusted operating return on equity reflects strong returns through the third quarter, and we expect further improvement in the fourth quarter. Through the third quarter, we generated approximately $575 million of excess capital and returned the majority to shareholders. We ended the quarter with approximately $250 million of excess capital. That brings me to how we are deploying that capital on slide 11. Our cash generation supports our ability to invest in the business, maintain financial flexibility, and return excess capital to shareholders. We repurchased $100 million of shares in the third quarter and $400 million year to date, and expect to repurchase an additional $150 million of shares in the fourth quarter. Since year-end 2022, these repurchases have reduced our diluted share count by approximately 14%, providing a meaningful benefit to per-share results.

At the same time, the board approved an increase in the quarterly common dividend by 21% to $0.57 per share, reflecting confidence in our earnings and cash generation. The board also added $500 million to our share repurchase authorization, giving us capacity to continue returning excess capital. Finally, we made the remaining payment for OneAmerica after successfully completing the integration during the second quarter. The acquisition added meaningful scale, expanded our capabilities, and created significant value for shareholders. We enter the final quarter of 2026 with a stronger earnings base and significant financial flexibility, providing a solid foundation for continued growth in 2027. Our priorities are clear: deliver profitable growth, invest with discipline, and return excess capital to shareholders. With that, I'll turn it back to Heather.

Thanks, Mike. Let me close on slide 12. This quarter demonstrates the earnings power of our diversified businesses and the progress we're making across Voya. We're delivering the improvement in the second half of 2026 that we said was coming, while taking actions that position us for continued earnings growth, commercial momentum, and increased cash generation. Across the company, we are driving growth in Retirement and Investment Management, continuing to improve margins in Employee Benefits, and staying disciplined on expenses across the company, all while providing our customers with outstanding service at every opportunity. Our disciplined execution, alongside our capacity for growing cash generation, gives us room to invest in future growth while continuing to reliably return significant capital to shareholders. Before we go to questions, I want to thank our employees.

Every day, their focus and commitment help our customers navigate some of life's most important financial decisions with greater confidence. With that, I'll turn it over to the operator so we can take your questions.

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you may press the star key, then one on your touch-tone phone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. To withdraw questions, you may please press star two. As a reminder, participants are limited to one question and one follow-up question. One moment while we poll for questions. Our first question is from Mike Ward with UBS. Please proceed.

Hi, guys. Thank you. Good morning. I was just wondering if you could dig into the softness in voluntary a little bit more in terms of the drivers and the outlook.

Yeah, happy to do so, Mike. Good morning, and Mike, will take your question.

Morning, Mike. How are you? With respect to the voluntary piece, it does get reported as part of voluntary disability and other, and there was an assumption unlocking that I mentioned on the prepared remarks. If you adjust for the assumption unlocking, you will get a reported loss ratio of 59% in that line item. But again, that includes disability and other in there. When you look at just core Supplemental Health loss ratios, that was approximately 54%, very consistent with what I shared last quarter and in line with expectations. The difference between the 59% and the 54%, it is really due to short-term disability loss ratios, which are higher than what we see in voluntary. That is as planned. Then some one-time legacy UL impacts that we do not expect to repeat.

Stepping back as we look at loss ratios within voluntary supp health, again, in line with expectations. I have talked about this earlier in the year, that we expected net margins, importantly, to be consistent year-over-year as we have really gotten after expense actions. You saw that again this quarter. We also think that it is really important for us to offer best-in-class voluntary products. That is what is ultimately going to drive more penetration with our customers and lead to more premium growth over time.

Thank you. Thanks, Mike. Shifting over to Investment Management, the investment performance was a bit softer. Any incremental detail there, and is the kind of one basis point compression in retail at least a good run rate?

Yeah. Thanks, Mike. We'll let Matt take your question.

Hi, Mike. Thanks for the question. Yeah, on the quarter, a bit softer in the one-year number, as you allude to. We show the one-year number acknowledging that it will be quite volatile. The three and the five and the 10 still very strong longer term, importantly, which is really the driver of client engagement. For that one-year number, think about the rising yield environment and our duration sensitivity within fixed income being a headwind. There is meaningful market rotation in equities. That was an incremental headwind, not that large in equities. The biggest one was in our income and growth franchise, as we break out on page 20 of the earnings deck. That's a pretty unique product with a blend of convertible bonds, high-yield assets, as well as equities.

You saw real underperformance in the convertible asset class and the duration sensitivity of high yield as well. So, you'll see volatility in that unique product over time. You've seen it in past quarters. I'd say that while large on the quarter, not meaningful decline engagement. Flows there remain strong, engagement remains strong, and a bit of a feature, not a bug, as far as being different than broad indices and peers. One, to follow on for your retail question, yeah, a little bit of softness in retail. Nothing really super meaningful there to call out. I think year-over-year, we're 32.8 relative to 33.1, so down a bit, just marginally. It's hard to forecast quarter to quarter. Some of these higher fee, higher return products had headwinds on the quarter at a market level.

Yeah, a decent level on a go-forward basis, but really not a trend that I'd call out.

Yeah, Mike, my broader step back on Investment Management is really resilient performance all around. You think about the positive flows, strong long-term investment performance across the board, healthy fee revenues, strong margins. We feel good about the overall performance of the Investment Management business.

Our next question is from Tom Gallagher with Evercore ISI. Please proceed.

Morning. First question is on the Stop Loss side. Mike, I heard your comment that claims remain favorable on 2026 accident year versus 2024 and 2025. When I've listened to other players in the market on Stop Loss, you seem to be unique in that others are describing 2026 as still elevated, but consistent with pricing and expectations. What do you make of that? Is it your re-underwriting you think that's driving that? Also related to Stop Loss, how are you thinking about pricing heading into January 2027 renewals? Thanks.

Yeah. Hey, good morning, Tom. Maybe I'll just start with a couple comments and then toss it to Mike. I think in terms of peers, we've talked about the fact that we were early, we're executing against the two-year recovery. We do feel very good about the pricing and underwriting actions we've taken, and I'll let Mike unpack, and we continue to see favorability in the 2026 book of business. I think it's really a matter of us being earlier and executing against that margin improvement, and we do feel very good about our ability to get this business back to the long-term earnings trajectory that we expect. Mike?

Heather, I completely agree, and good morning, Tom. We were early, and maybe a way to think about that maybe evidence it in a way that's helpful for the listeners is that when we were getting rate in late 2024 for the 2025 business, I mean, we were nearly alone in this, and we shrank the book. That was intentional. The premium was down 15% because we're going out and getting 21% rate increases when that isn't happening. You look at last year, we were able to get even more rate coming into 2026, 24%, but we were able to keep the premium relatively flat. That was probably what I would call the leg two of this journey. As we've been talking about for a long time, this was going to be a two-year piece because we were early.

I think the difference this year, maybe to get to your second question as it relates to 2027, we're seeing the hardest market we probably ever have seen in Stop Loss. We've been able to get even more rate heading into 2027. That's true of what we priced in non-Jan 2026 and what's happening early days with respect to the 2027 book. We're also seeing more RFPs, which is allowing us to be very, very selective in what we're writing. I think the step back is we're feeling very encouraged by where the claims experience is. By the way, that's through October, not just September 30th. I think that's encouraging. We feel very good about how the market is hardening, and we're being able to be very selective around the risk.

I think earlier this year, Heather, Jay, and I have been talking about the fact that this is the best that we felt around Stop Loss. I think we're continuing to see that as we move into November.

That's helpful color. Thanks for that. My follow-up is just on the Retirement business, how I guess you're seeing diverging trends. On one hand, full service flows have been soft. On the other hand, recordkeeping flows have been quite strong. Can you talk a little bit about, do you see that sort of bifurcation continuing, and what will that mean to growth and returns in the Retirement business? Because I think recordkeeping is lower margin, so how do you triangulate all that? Thanks.

Yeah. Tom, I will let Jay unpack that, but I think the broader step back as we think about retirement is, flows is certainly one metric. We are proud of our results, fifth consecutive year of positive flows. Jay will unpack, we are also looking at other metrics that frankly drive a more valuable franchise in terms of revenue growth. Jay?

Yeah, I appreciate the question on this. Listen, if you look at our mix this quarter, it is really been no different than the mix we have had in prior quarters. We did have visibility when we talked about flows early in the year, that the middle of this year, we would see flows. We saw that. We did expect this large plan that was implemented this quarter on the recordkeeping side. Similarly, as we look to 2027, we have got visibility into our sales and pipeline, and we will be back half-weighted, and that gets to the visibility. When I look at respect to full service and the question, we did have some OneAmerica outflows, finishing what was a really successful integration this quarter. We did see, though, overall, our Q3 full service outflows are in line with the broader industry, and there is some equity market impact there.

You are going to see modest outflows in full service going forward, but that is really not how we judge kind of the retirement progress. We look beyond flows, specifically delivering strong results in our largest business. Full-year sales growth right now is in the mid-teens. We have got net plan growth. I look at a very high 38% margin business. While we have been investing in wealth management, we have got almost $14 billion of defined contribution net flows and a 98% plan retention. Behind all that, our participant accounts right now are up more than 5%, and that is over 10 million, which is a really healthy number. On a trailing 12-month operating revenue, which is really the ultimate equalizer on revenue, is up 6%, with fee income up 12%. Now fee income represents approximately 60% of operating revenue. So, really a strong quarter in our largest business.

Our next question is from Suneet Kamath with Jefferies. Please proceed.

Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to start with the severance actions. It seems like we've had like two of these charges now in each of the past two quarters. Feels like they've come as a surprise to us. Maybe they were part of your plan all along. I guess, is there a risk now that you're. Maybe to start, what is sort of behind the need to take these actions, and is there a risk that you're sort of cutting into the bone at some point on this?

Yeah. Suneet, good morning. It's Heather. I'll start and just say, look, whenever we make these decisions, which are very thoughtful, we are never going to do so and jeopardize the service we're providing for our customers, so that's first and foremost. This is a follow-through of what we've mentioned all year long, which is how we're self-funding our growth initiatives, and specifically the build-out of the wealth management, the leave insourcing, frankly, some of the other things we're doing across our businesses of expanding MEP and PEP capabilities, broadening array of privates and Investment Management. So, a lot of growth initiatives, but let me let Mike unpack that for you a little more.

Yeah. I just would emphasize, and maybe Suneet, like, look, we take it really seriously, the respect of not surprising investors, as you, I'm sure, understand. We've got to be a little bit more careful on the severance front because that affects people. As Heather said, when we were doing planning coming into this year, talking about wealth management, we were very clear that we were going to self-fund those investments. That happened at the beginning of the year. We're right in the middle of budget and planning for 2027 right now. When we talked about that, it was really important for us to demonstrate that. I think we have, both with the actions we took in the second quarter and the third quarter.

What it's ultimately allowing us to do is, Heather just detailed, it's allowing us to offset inflation, it's allowing us to hit the margins that we've shared, but importantly, it's allowing us to continue to invest for growth. This is really not a surprise. We've been planning this all year and trying to make that as clear to shareholders as we possibly could without crossing a line.

Okay. That's understandable. My second line of questioning, I wanted to come back to something I don't think we've talked about in a while, which is the DTA. If I go back to 2021, I think you guys talked about maybe a five-year view where 50%-60% of it would be utilized. I think we're kind of at that window now. Just want to get an update there. Then in the past, when you guys were asked about M&A, I think the prior CFO used to talk about the DTA as being something that you'd want value for, because it could go away in some types of transactions. So, I just wanted to get maybe an update there. Like I said, I don't think we've talked about this issue in some time. Thanks.

Thanks. On the second piece, Suneet, we wouldn't in any way speculate with respect to M&A and how that would work, because ultimately it's going to depend on facts and circumstances with respect to the DTA. But when you think about just as far as us being a cash taxpayer over the next handful of years, continue to expect that to not be material from a cash tax payment for the next three to four years. We still, when we look at the GAAP DTA, call it roughly $2 billion, the net present value of that particular tax asset is still close to $1 billion. So, we've been able to continue to maintain a pretty strong tax asset, and we're taking advantage of it. Frankly, it's a big part of the 90% after-tax adjusted operating earnings that's turning into cash.

We continue to expect to benefit from that. I would think three to four years, Suneet, before that we get to that point where it's not fully offsetting. At that point, we'd still have some benefits. I wouldn't think about that as a cliff. It's going to be more of a glide path.

Our next question is from Ryan Krueger with KBW. Please proceed.

Thanks. Good morning. First one was just on the sub-advisor change. Is that fully done now, or the $5 billion that came out this quarter, or would you expect any further impacts there?

Good morning, Ryan. Matt will take your question.

Hi, Ryan. Yes, happy to provide more details. So, we had signaled last quarter that we had a sub-advisor outflow coming. So, this is the $5 billion that you will see in the divestiture line item. It is there because this is tied to the AGI acquisition some years ago, where we brought on the sub-advisory business to where we distribute through this channel as opposed to through our own distribution. Also think of that as having about the same average basis points as our retail business broadly. So, if you would have dimensioned the revenue, I think in the $15 million range on a full run rate revenue for a year basis.

Obviously, just partial for the quarter and for 2026 overall, but something that we can continue to outgrow when we think about the business more broadly, a bit over $1 billion and continue to grow quite nicely over time. As far as what's left, still a relationship there, about $5 billion. These are in areas where we continue to be very confident in our Investment Management capabilities and ability to, over time, also distribute our own products. Sub-advisor can be volatile, it's nice business, but you can see flows that are chunky from time to time. That's what you're seeing here. But our income and growth franchise team is strong, and we look forward to continued growth.

Thanks. Then one follow-up on the voluntary benefits in other. The 54% in Supplemental Health makes sense, but it seems as you do grow disability and it has a higher loss ratio, I was trying to understand how to think about where that total loss ratio expectation might be going forward, as that does become a little bit larger part of the line.

I think at this point, I wouldn't want to project, just given it's so early in the build. I mean, when you think about disability, Ryan, it's about 2% of total premium, so it's really, really small. It did have a point or a point and a half impact in the quarter. I think what we'll do to the extent that that changes in any way to give you a sense of how to think about what's running through that voluntary benefit to disability and other line, we'll signal that. But right now, I would just say kind of mid-50s is what you should expect coming through that line from a loss ratio. That's aggregate, so the 54% supp health, including all the other pieces, disability, which is really, really small.

I think for us, the step back on the benefits business, though, is that when we look at the progress that we're making with respect to excess capital generation, it's been a big story for us. We've doubled the earnings in that business, more than doubled the earnings in that business this year. What we talked about in some of the questions around Stop Loss is certainly feeling very good about that. So, our expectation as we look into next year is the benefit business is going to continue to be a key part of the excess capital generation. It's why we have a lot of confidence in the fourth quarter and beyond, continue to generate more capital. The benefit business is going to be a big part of that.

Our next question is from Wes Carmichael with Wells Fargo. Please proceed.

Hey, thank you. Good morning. I just wanted to come back to Stop Loss headed into the year, and maybe just comment on how committed you are to that business longer term, given the amount of attention it's taken.

Yeah, sure. I'll let Mike start, and then I'll add some additional color.

Yeah, thinking about it the same, Wes, like the reserves, high end of the best estimate range, follow the experience that's coming in, and then adjust reserves based on that same methodology. As I shared in my prepared remarks, and we were getting into a little bit with Tom, the experience is running well through October. So, if that continues, I think that's a good sign for the fourth quarter. I think we've talked about the fact that we expected loss ratios and Stop Loss to be down year-over-year, even on a calendar year basis. But our main focus is pricing this business at or better than target margins. I think we're making a ton of progress on that front.

I think it's certainly boding well for the fourth quarter, but Heather, Jay, and I are going to see what happens in November and December, and then make the right judgment.

Yeah, and then maybe, Wes, to your broader question about just how are we thinking about the product. Our focus has always been just making sure we get this business back to the target loss ratio. That remains our key priority. As we've talked about, we do see with a hardening market, and we see incredible client demand for this product. There is a real need for this product, and so it's one of those, let's land the plane on what we expect. As I've said all year long, we think that this is a strategic asset in our portfolio, and it's one that we believe does give us leverage with some of our largest consultant relationships, given the fact that there is a great demand and lower supply. So, I would just say is that we think this is valuable.

We're going to get to restore the loss ratios, and we'll always lift our head up, and we're always evaluating our portfolio broadly from a strategic perspective. Right now, we want to make sure we execute on what we said was in front of us.

Thank you. That's helpful. Just coming back to the severance-related actions, appreciate your commentary on 2026 admin expenses, but I think, Heather, you also mentioned there should be some benefit in 2027 as well. So, just wondering how you're thinking about that benefit for next year from these actions you've taken over the past couple of quarters.

Yeah, I'll just start, and what Mike and I and the team have talked about is that we're focused on creating operating leverage as we go into 2027. We think that's also an important driver of shareholder value, and so that remains a focus, making sure that we're using some of these expense actions to be able to reinvest in the high-growth areas that we've talked about, that we see high return opportunities, particularly wealth management. But I'll let Mike talk a little bit more specifics.

Yeah, and I'll kind of build off your theme, Heather, on just operating leverage. But maybe, Wes, a way to think about it, again, we're in middle of budget and planning, so fourth quarter call is the right time to get more specific, but we can give you a sense. In Retirement, this operating leverage concept, and this has come up in a few different ways. Suneet was asking about this earlier with respect to the severance actions. We are creating operating leverage in Retirement. What is it allowing us to do? It's allowing us to invest in growth capabilities like wealth management and maintain margins. So, that 35%-39% unchanged, you should expect us to be in that margin range. You should expect us to continue to be investing where we see growth opportunities, like the managed wealth management piece.

In Investment Management, we are also creating operating leverage there. This quarter, a little bit more of the severance was associated with the Investment Management business, but we're at a margin, call it roughly 30%, that we're comfortable with. Now, that's coming off a base that was in the low 20s. We're now in the high 20s. We like that, so there's probably a little bit of operating leverage we see heading into next year. But again, that balance of investing in the business at the same time that we're making sure that what gets to the bottom line is what we plan to. Then last on EB, I think this is the one where I just keep coming back to on pricing, underwriting, alongside the expense discipline.

That's just what gives us a lot of confidence on the margin expansion continuing for the balance of this year into next.

Our next question is from Josh Shanker with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please proceed.

Yes, thank you for taking my questions. Just a question on proxy battles and whatnot. Obviously, there's an activist investor who's making a lot of noise in your stock. I'm wondering if their recent behavior and the proxy battle they intend to engage in changes how you will engage that strategy and that discussion.

Yeah, Josh, thanks for the question. Nothing's really changed in how we think about this all year long, and we're not going to speculate on any outcome. Our focus is on talking directly to our shareholders. We've got a robust shareholder engagement program, and we find the best feedback we get is when we're in front of them one-on-one, and we can answer their questions directly and frankly hear their feedback. That's absolutely something we look forward to doing after this call. The second thing I'd mention, Josh, is that our focus is on running the franchise and delivering value for our shareholders and our customers, and I think this quarter is another great example of us doing that, right? We're driving revenue and earnings growth. We're showing great expense discipline. We're improving the margins in Employee Benefits.

That is all collectively leading to increase in cash generation, and we are returning that capital back to shareholders. So, we think those are good signs of a well-run franchise.

Our next question is from Alex Scott with Barclays. Please proceed.

Hey, wanted to follow up on the margin bid in Retirement, and specifically I am interested to what degree are you going to leverage the expense discipline to continue to build out recordkeeping, get more competitive on price in some of the platform offerings there?

Yeah, let me start, and then I will toss it over to Jay. I think one of the things you will hear from the team is we continue to have a lot of pricing discipline across all of our different target markets, but one of the benefits is the fact that because we are a scaled provider where we play, we are able to sell business at attractive margins across each of our businesses while continuing to reinvest. Let me toss it to Jay to add a little more color.

Yeah, if you think about the Retirement business, being a top five defined contribution provider by participant account, it gets to the strength of distribution. Some of the areas where we see opportunities to grow in market, Heather talked about our 50% growth in emerging markets, 20% in mid-market, and 50% in government. That happens because you make those opportunities to invest in distribution where you see an opportunity to gain market share. In our service model, the easiest way to continue to retain 98% of your business is to make sure that your service delivery is where it needs to be and putting the customer at the center of that. So, enhancing our capabilities and how we service our customer. The last is the tie-through with wealth management.

Really important, this bridge between Retirement and wealth is real with over 10 million participants continuing to invest in guidance and advice at the workplace, listening to our clients that they are asking for this advice. That is playing out in RFPs on the Retirement side, and it is allowing us to continue to maintain these relationships to and through Retirement. It is early days, but that is really where we have been focused in our investments.

Yeah, and maybe Alex, if I can just build on Jay's last point for a second. I think it's also important to cross over the collection of our businesses, the value we have between Retirement and Investment Management. When you think about it from a pricing perspective and leverage, the fact that we've got our own general account that's managed by our own team, as well as some of our own proprietary Investment Management products, those give us some pricing flexibility within the Retirement business, and it just speaks to another of the point of the collective nature of our businesses and the value of the combined entity.

Voya Financial (VOYA) Q3 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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