Will Metlife Inc (MET) Help You Retire Rich?

Conditions in the insurance industry have been extremely difficult for years. A combination of poor investment returns and big natural disasters has hit the property and casualty segment, while falling bond yields have especially hurt life insurance companies. That has forced many companies to make big adjustments to their coverage, with Hartford Financial Services Group Inc (NYSE:HIG) moving out of the individual life insurance business to focus on property and casualty and with MetLife having chosen to stop selling new long-term care policies.

But recently, things have started turning around for MetLife. After dropping for decades, interest rates have finally started to move higher, and getting higher yields for bonds will help not just Metlife Inc (NYSE:MET) but also peers Manulife Financial Corporation (USA) (NYSE:MFC) and Prudential Financial Inc (NYSE:PRU) . Moreover, both MetLife and Prudential have substantial exposure to the Japanese economy, and with Japan’s central bank poised to join the rest of the world in aggressively fighting deflation by using monetary easing, both companies could see improving conditions there.

In its most recent quarter, MetLife got permission from the FDIC and the Fed to stop being treated as a bank-holding company, since it sold its banking assets to General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) . The move will leave MetLife subject to regulation as a regular insurance company, which is less involved than the regulations that banks have to meet.

For retirees and conservative investors, MetLife’s failure to grow its dividend and its extreme volatility leaves it lacking the best attributes for a retirement stock. Although Metlife Inc (NYSE:MET) has made a lot of progress since 2008, it still hasn’t demonstrated that it belongs in retirement portfolios.

The article Will MetLife Help You Retire Rich? originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Dan Caplinger owns warrants on Hartford Financial Services (NYSE:HIG). The Motley Fool owns shares of General Electric.

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