Assurant, Inc. (AIZ): what the price requires
At today's price, Assurant, Inc. (AIZ) is priced for 15.4% return on equity. boothcheck doesn't publish a fair value or a price target; it shows what the price assumes, so you can judge whether that bar is too high.
Generated: 2026-07-14 · Exported: 2026-07-16 · Source: https://boothcheck.com/report/AIZ
Headline
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Ticker | AIZ |
| Company | Assurant, Inc. |
| Current price | $280.25/sh |
| Composition | Global Lifestyle 77% / Global Housing 23% |
What The Price Requires (Inversion)
The assumption today's price embeds, recovered by inverting the valuation.
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Inversion basis | financials |
| Return on equity needed | 15.4% |
| Return on equity now | 14.9% |
| ROE gap | +0.5pp |
| Price-to-book | 2.37x |
Solve inputs: computed at a 8.8% cost of equity with 4% terminal growth over a 5-year stage, on common book equity (FY2026); each 1pp of cost of equity moves the implied ROE ~2.4pp.
How unusual the bet is: within-range
| Reference | Value |
|---|---|
| vs own history | +1.47σ |
| cohort percentile (of 80 peers) | 69 |
| sustained it ~10 years at this level | 59% |
| implied end-window share | 0% |
Valuation X-Ray
The price is supported by asset-based and earnings-power and relative-multiple and growth-DCF value. A value/asset-supported name, not a pure growth bet.
How the valuation models price the stock relative to the market price. Price/FV above 1.0 means the market pays more than that lens defends (expensive); at or below 1.0 the lens can defend the price.
| Family | Median price/FV | Models | Reads |
|---|---|---|---|
| Asset | 1.24x | 3 | expensive |
| Earnings | 0.89x | 2 | justifies |
| Relative | 0.41x | 3 | justifies |
| Growth | 1.09x | 1 | expensive |
Families that justify the price: Asset, Earnings, Relative, Growth
The models below discount at their own flat-beta convention rates (cost of equity 9.3%, WACC 4.1%); the inversion above states its own rate.
Per-Model Detail (n=9)
| Model | Family | FV | Price/FV | Applicable | Methodology |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DCF Perpetual Growth | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Bank Fair Value (P/TBV) | — | $152.60 | 1.84x | yes | TBVPS $53.86 × 2.83x (ROE (TTM) 17.0% / CoE 9.3%, g=5.0% (sustainable: 65% retention × ROE, 5% cap; not the terminal-growth assumption)) |
| Relative Valuation | Relative | $238.92 | 1.17x | yes | P/E 11x (static sector reference · 2026-04), scenarios: 9.1x / 11.0x / 12.9x (bear / base = reference held flat / bull), EV/EBITDA 10x |
| Simple DDM | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Two-Stage DDM | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Simple Excess Return | Asset | $215.41 | 1.30x | yes | BV/sh $116.93, ROE (TTM) 17.0%, ke 9.3% |
| Two-Stage Excess Return | Asset | $288.58 | 0.97x | yes | 5yr excess ROE then converge to ke=9.3% |
| Discounted Future Market Cap | Growth | $257.38 | 1.09x | yes | Rev $13.2B, growth 9% (input: historical growth; tapered), Terminal P/S: 0.9x / 1.1x / 1.3x (bear / base = today's held flat / bull, cap 8x) |
| Peter Lynch Fair Value | Relative | $682.85 | 0.41x | yes | EPS $19.51, growth 35% (input: historical EPS growth), PEG=0.40 (Undervalued) |
| Margin Trajectory | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Earnings Power Value | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| Residual Income | Asset | — | — | no | — |
| Graham Number | Asset | $226.56 | 1.24x | yes | √(22.5 × EPS $19.51 × BVPS $116.93) — Graham's conservative floor |
| EV/EBITDA Relative | Relative | — | — | no | — |
| FCF Yield | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| SBC-Adj FCF Yield | Earnings | — | — | no | — |
| Ben Graham Formula | Earnings | $629.52 | 0.45x | yes | EPS $19.51 × (8.5 + 2×15.0%) × (4.4 / 5.3%) |
| ROIC-Justified P/B | Asset | — | — | no | — |
| P/Sales Sector | Relative | — | — | no | — |
| PEG Fair Value | Relative | $731.62 | 0.38x | yes | EPS $19.51 × (PEG 1.5 × growth 25.0% (input: historical EPS growth)) → PE 37.5x |
| Earnings Yield | Earnings | $210.92 | 1.33x | yes | EPS $19.51 / required return 9.3% (Rf 4.3% + ERP 5.0%) |
| Funds From Operations Multiple | Relative | — | — | no | — |
| Clinical Phase NPV | Growth | — | — | no | — |
| Merton | Asset | — | — | no | — |
| V5 Mechanical | — | — | — | no | — |
Solvency
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Share count CAGR (buyback) | -2.8% |
Deposit/float-funded balance sheet: debt is funding, not corporate leverage, and GAAP operating cash flow follows loan flows. Net-debt, interest-coverage, and cash-burn lenses do not apply. The solvency frame for a financial is regulatory capital and payout capacity (CET1, stress buffer, dividends plus buybacks against earnings).
Bullet Takeaways
The first quarter of 2026 was the best in company history: net income rose 87 percent to $274.1 million, adjusted EBITDA rose 56 percent to $441.5 million, and earnings per share reached $5.52 from $2.86.
At $259.71 the stock trades near 2.2 times book value, and the price assumes a return on equity of about 14.6 percent, just below the roughly 14.9 percent the company has recently earned. The valuation is broadly fair, with the blended methods landing near the price.
Full-year guidance is far more modest, calling for low-single-digit growth in adjusted EBITDA and earnings excluding catastrophes, which says the first-quarter surge is not the run rate.
Bull Case
The earnings trajectory has inflected, and the engine is the right one. The first quarter of 2026 was Assurant's best quarter in history: net income jumped 87 percent to $274.1 million, adjusted EBITDA rose 56 percent to $441.5 million, earnings per share reached $5.52 against $2.86 a year earlier, and revenue grew 11 percent to $3.42 billion. The standout was Global Lifestyle, which makes up about 77 percent of the business and grew adjusted EBITDA 20 percent. Global Lifestyle is the mobile-device-protection and connected-living franchise, a recurring, embedded business where Assurant handles "data analytics, customer support and claims handling, supply chain services, service delivery and repair and logistics management" for its partners (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001267238-26-000010). That deep operational integration with device makers, carriers and retailers is sticky and scales with the global installed base of phones and connected devices.
The segment economics have been compounding well beyond a single quarter. Segment adjusted EBITDA across the business grew from $574.2 million to $671.2 million to $858.7 million over the reported years (same filing), a steady climb driven by the lifestyle franchise. Because the recurring protection products renew and the partner relationships are long-lived, the cash flow is more stable than a typical property-casualty insurer's, which is why the static asset, earnings-power and relative-multiple frames all support the price rather than reaching for it.
The capital story reinforces the earnings story. Assurant earns a return on equity near 14.9 percent against a cost of equity under 9 percent, so it creates value on the capital it retains, and it returns the rest. The company guided $300 to $350 million of share repurchases for 2026, at the upper end of its range, and pays a quarterly dividend of $0.88. An insurer earning well above its cost of capital, led by a growing, recurring lifestyle franchise, and returning capital steadily, is a value-and-asset-supported name where the return on equity the price assumes is essentially what the company already delivers.
Bear Case
The capital-allocation choice on display is buying back stock at 2.2 times book value, and that frames the whole caution. Assurant guided $300 to $350 million of repurchases for 2026, but at more than two times book, buybacks are far less accretive than they would be for an insurer trading near book, and they tie up capital that could cushion a bad year. The implied return on equity baked into the price is about 14.6 percent, essentially the 14.9 percent the company recently earned, so the market is paying a premium-to-book multiple for a return that has no obvious room to rise; the return-on-equity ceiling sits around 17.4 percent, and the company is already most of the way there. Paying 2.2 times book for a business already near its return ceiling leaves little margin for the return to improve and real downside if it slips.
The headline quarter flatters the run rate, and management's own guidance admits it. Despite first-quarter net income up 87 percent, full-year guidance calls only for low-single-digit growth in adjusted EBITDA and earnings excluding catastrophes, with Global Lifestyle around 10 percent. That gap means the first quarter benefited from favorable comparisons and items that do not repeat, and an investor extrapolating the 87 percent jump would be badly misreading the business. The price is fair only if the steady low-single-digit base, not the headline surge, is what continues.
The smaller Global Housing segment is the volatility the model carries. Lender-placed and related housing coverage is exposed to catastrophes, and the filing warns that "actual results may differ materially from the analytical models we use" in "pricing, catastrophe risks, reserving and capital management," and that the company purchases reinsurance "but if the severity of an event" exceeds expectations the results can suffer (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001267238-26-000010). A heavy hurricane season can erase a chunk of a year's earnings in the housing book, and the same buyback program that returns capital in calm years reduces the cushion when a catastrophe hits. A premium-to-book insurer near its return ceiling, with a headline quarter that overstates the run rate and a catastrophe-exposed segment, is priced for steadiness it cannot fully guarantee.
Valuation
An insurer is valued on the return it earns on its capital, so the price is read off price-to-book rather than an operating multiple. Assurant trades near 2.2 times book value, and the price implies a sustained return on equity of about 14.6 percent against a cost of equity near 8.9 percent, with a 4 percent terminal growth assumption over a five-year stage. The asset, earnings-power, relative-multiple and forward-growth frames all support the price, and the blended central value across methods sits right around the $259.71 (June 27, 2026) quote, so the stock is broadly fairly valued rather than cheap or dear.
The key is that the assumed 14.6 percent return is essentially what Assurant already earns, about 14.9 percent, so the price is not asking for improvement, only for durability. That is a reasonable ask given the recurring Global Lifestyle franchise, but two things temper it. First, the premium-to-book multiple sits in the upper half of the peer group, and historically only about 61 percent of firms earning a return at this level sustained it over a long horizon, so the multiple already credits above-average persistence. Second, the return is near the company's own ceiling around 17.4 percent, leaving little upside to the return that drives the value. The first-quarter surge does not change the math, since full-year guidance points to low-single-digit growth excluding catastrophes. The investment case is therefore a steady-compounder thesis at a fair-to-full price: the reward is modest if the lifestyle franchise keeps delivering a mid-teens return, and the risk is a catastrophe year or a fade in the return that a 2.2 times book multiple does not cushion.
Catalysts
Global Lifestyle growth is the central catalyst. The segment grew adjusted EBITDA 20 percent in the first quarter and is guided to roughly 10 percent for the full year, so the quarterly trend in lifestyle earnings, driven by mobile device protection and connected-living volumes, is the main signal that the recurring engine is holding. Because lifestyle is about three-quarters of the business, its growth rate largely sets the consolidated result.
Capital return is the second catalyst. Assurant guided $300 to $350 million of share repurchases for 2026, at the upper end of its range, and pays a $0.88 quarterly dividend. The pace of buybacks and any change to the dividend are the items to track, with the caveat that repurchases near 2.2 times book are less accretive than at lower multiples, so the value created depends on the return on equity staying high.
Catastrophe experience is the swing factor. The smaller Global Housing segment carries weather and hurricane exposure, and the company relies on reinsurance and catastrophe models that can be wrong in a severe event. Hurricane-season losses are the principal downside catalyst, while a benign season supports the low-single-digit full-year guide. Quarterly results remain the main proof point on whether lifestyle growth and the mid-teens return on equity are holding against any housing volatility.
Peer Cohorts (Per Segment, With Filing Citations)
Global Lifestyle (reported)
- KMPR (Kemper Corporation)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- AFG (AMERICAN FINANCIAL GROUP, INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- ORI (OLD REPUBLIC INTERNATIONAL CORP)
- (no filing in the citation store)
Global Housing (reported)
- HCI (HCI Group, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- PLMR (Palomar Holdings, Inc.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- ORI (OLD REPUBLIC INTERNATIONAL CORP)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- MCY (MERCURY GENERAL CORP)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- RLI (RLI Corp)
- (no filing in the citation store)
- THG (HANOVER INSURANCE GROUP, INC.)
- (no filing in the citation store)
Methodology Note
- Priced-in inversion: the valuation is inverted on the current price to recover the operating-income growth, duration, and steady-state margin the price embeds (ROE for financials, FFO growth for REITs).
- Valuation x-ray: the valuation models, grouped into four families (asset, earnings, relative, growth). Each model is expressed as a price/FV ratio (distance from price), not a point fair-value estimate. The spread across families is the disagreement.
- Solvency: net cash/debt, net-debt-to-NOPAT, interest coverage, and share-count CAGR from EDGAR financials (net debt / FFO and fixed-charge coverage for REITs; regulatory-capital framing for financials).
- Peer cohorts: per-segment comparables with deep-linkable SEC filing citations.
Fundamentals sourced from SEC EDGAR filings. Current price from Databento. The priced-in inversion and valuation x-ray are computed by the boothcheck engine; narrative composed by AI from the structured data.