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| With more than $325 billion in general account portfolio assets and a multi-billion dollar annual cash flow, MetLife Investments was an important contributor to MetLife’s financial performance in 2006, generating approximately $17.6 billion of net investment income. |
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| Investments engaged in several innovative investment activities in 2006, including the introduction of new asset classes, new businesses and a focus on skilled portfolio management. Indeed, MetLife’s investment professionals are always looking at new ways to profitably access the market and manage the company’s assets to achieve strong results for MetLife. In 2006, Investments did this and much more to solidify MetLife’s position as a premier asset manager. |
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| While spread management was a key focus in 2006, Real Estate and Agricultural Investments also played high-visibility roles. Specifically, the sale of Peter Cooper Village and Stuyvesant Town (see sidebar below) and the origination of a landmark mortgage loan originated by MetLife’s Timberland Finance Group were significant transactions. In 2006, MetLife’s Timberland Finance Group placed a $1.6 billion mortgage loan secured by 2.3 million acres of timberland throughout the United States. A significant player in the agricultural investments arena for almost 90 years, MetLife is one of North America's largest private lenders to agriculture. |
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| New and Innovative Opportunities |
| 2006 was also a year marked by many firsts for Investments. “In 2006, MetLife was the first life insurer to become a member of the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York,” notes Andy DeRosa, who heads the capital markets desk. “This membership enables us to tap into a new source of reliable funding and liquidity for MetLife.” |
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| MetLife also developed an innovative joint initiative with Farmer Mac to obtain funds at attractive interest rates by pledging MetLife’s agricultural loans as collateral. Also during the year, MetLife executed the industry’s first global guaranteed interest contract in the developing Canadian “Maple Bond” market, which was created in 2005 when Canada relaxed foreign investment restrictions on Canadian pension plans and retirement funds. |
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| All together, these and other new initiatives will be critical to MetLife being able to achieve strong investment returns in the future. |
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| In 2006, MetLife completed its $5.4 billion sale of Peter Cooper Village and Stuyvesant Town, a premier residential property that was an important component of MetLife’s real estate equity portfolio for nearly 60 years. Associates from across the enterprise came together to help complete the single largest real estate transaction in U.S. history. |
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| "This property was a prominent asset in MetLife’s real estate portfolio and we were very pleased with the market reaction we received. This sale really demonstrated what the MetLife team is all about as departments all across MetLife worked together to complete this transaction, enabling MetLife to diversify its real estate equity portfolio in record time." |
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| –David Politano
regional director, Real Estate Investments Northeast Region |
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