Prudential

Prudential Financial, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides insurance, investment management, and other financial products and services in the United States and internationally. It operates through eight segments: PGIM, Retirement, Group Insurance, Individual Annuities, Individual Life, Assurance IQ, International Businesses, and Closed Block. 

The company offers investment management services and solutions related to public fixed income, public equity, real estate debt and equity, private credit and other alternatives, and multi-asset class strategies to institutional and retail clients, as well as its general account. It also provides a range of retirement investment, and income products and services to retirement plan sponsor in the public, private, and not-for-profit sectors; and group life, long-term and short-term group disability, and group corporate-, bank-, and trust-owned life insurance in the United States, primarily to institutional clients for use in connection with employee and membership benefits plans, as well as sells accidental death and dismemberment, and other supplemental health solutions; and provides plan administration services in connection with its insurance coverages. 

In addition, the company develops and distributes individual variable and fixed annuity products, principally to the mass affluent and affluent markets; and individual variable, term, and universal life insurance products to the mass middle, mass affluent, and affluent markets in the United States. Further, it provides third-party life, health, Medicare, property and casualty, and term life products to retail shoppers through its digital and independent agent channels. The company offers its products and services to individual and institutional customers through its proprietary and third-party distribution networks. Prudential Financial, Inc. was founded in 1875 and is headquartered in Newark, New Jersey.

Started in Newark, New Jersey, in 1875, Prudential was originally called The Widows and Orphans Friendly Society, then the Prudential Friendly Society. It was founded by John F. Dryden, who later became a U.S. Senator. In the beginning, the company sold only one product, burial insurance. Dryden was the president of Prudential until 1912. He was succeeded by his son Forrest F. Dryden, who was the president until 1922.

History of The Prudential Insurance Company of America up to about 1975 is the topic of the book Three Cents A Week, referring to the premium paid by early policyholders.

At the turn of the 20th century, Prudential and other large insurers reaped the bulk of their profits from industrial life insurance, or insurance sold by solicitors house-to-house in poor urban areas. For their insurance, industrial workers paid double what others paid for ordinary life insurance, and due to high lapse rates, as few as 1 in 12 policies reached maturity. Prominent lawyer and future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis helped pass a 1907 Massachusetts law to protect workers by allowing savings banks to sell life insurance at lower rates.

Prudential has evolved from a mutual insurance company to a joint stock company. It is now traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol PRU. The Prudential Stock was issued and started trading on the New York Stock Exchange on December 13, 2001.

On August 1, 2004, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced the discovery of terrorist threats against the Prudential Headquarters in Newark, New Jersey, prompting large-scale security measures that included concrete barriers outside the premises and internal X-ray machines. In the same year, a joint venture was formed between Prudential and China Everbright Limited. On November 28, 2007, the Prudential board of directors elected a new CEO, John R. Strangfeld, to replace retiring Arthur F. Ryan.

“Our mission is to help our customers achieve financial prosperity and peace of mind.”

“To distinguish Prudential as an admired multinational financial services leader, trusted partner, and provider of innovative solutions for growing and protecting wealth.”