MetLife Inc. may favor a spinoff of its Brighthouse Financial U.S. business rather than pursue an initial public offering of the unit, RBC Capital Markets analysts led by Eric Berg said after chatting with the company’s chief financial officer.
“A ‘spin’ would get the majority of the highly capital-markets-sensitive, and therefore volatile, retail business off of Met’s books a lot sooner than would an IPO,” the analysts said Wednesday in a note. “If speed is, in fact, what is first and foremost on the minds of Met’s leadership, then we would say a ‘spin’ of Brighthouse is Met’s most likely choice.”
