Hartford Financial Posts 2Q Loss

Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. said Wednesday that it lost $15 million in the second quarter, weighed down by losses on investments and a decline in premiums.

For the period ended June 30, the Hartford, Conn.-based insurance and financial services firm posted a loss of 6 cents per share. That compares with a profit of $543 million, or $1.73 per share, a year earlier.

On an adjusted basis, core earnings came in at $622 million, or $1.90 per share, down 11 percent from $696 million, or $2.22 a share, in the second quarter of 2008.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, on average, had been expecting earnings of $1.16 per share. Analyst estimates tend to exclude one-time, unusual items.

Shares rose 20 cents to finish regular trading Wednesday at $14.96. After hours, when the earnings report was released, shares tacked on 32 cents, rising 2 percent to $15.28.

Results were an improvement over the first quarter, when the company reported a bigger-than-expected loss of $1.2 billion as stock market declines forced The Hartford to lower estimates of future life insurance gross profits.

As the financial markets improved during the second quarter, results benefited from a $360 million, or $1.11 per share, after-tax gain related to the revision of its estimates of future gross profits in its life insurance operations. The Standard & Poor's 500 index jumped 15 percent during the second quarter, as improving economic data stirred a renewed sense of optimism in the market and stoked beliefs that the recession could end this year.

Still, the company reported a $649 million net realized capital loss, much more than the $156 million net realized capital loss recorded in the year-earlier period. The loss stemmed mostly from impairments on certain investments totaling $207 million, and a $300 million charge related to the closing of an investment agreement with the U.S. Treasury Department in June.