Any mortality fluctuation big enough to mean Prudential is paying off on an extra 1.1% of its policies is going to hit just about every other big ordinary life

Any mortality fluctuation big enough to mean Prudential is paying off on an extra 1.1% of its policies is going to hit just about every other big ordinary life and group life direct writer or reinsurer in the US similarly, and maybe even the large foreign reinsurers. The argument that the mortality fluctuation risk is a reason for breaking up Prudential depends on the either the premise that its insureds, in aggregate, may be significantly different from those of the other insurance companies, or on the fear that life insurance, a business around 200 years old, is a bad idea because most of the companies could be simultaneously impaired by a not implausible mortality fluctuation. Furthermore, the amount of assets under management by Prudential, mentioned in the article as a reason to fear trouble at the company, is irrelevant to the mortality fluctuation argument, as those assets are largely in separate accounts walled-off from the life insurance business.