To The Moon

$Manulife(MFC)$ is scheduled to release its fiscal Q3 2025 financial results after market close on Wednesday, November 12, 2025, with the conference call the following morning.

Q3 2025 Earnings Forecast and Expectations

Based on analyst consensus, expectations are generally positive for the quarter, though the growth rate is modest compared to the previous year's beat.

EPS Growth: The consensus forecast of $0.74 represents a slight increase over the $0.73 reported in the same quarter last year.

Recent Trends: Manulife has generally shown operational strength, with nearly half of life insurers in the sector recently exceeding expectations on a reported or core basis. However, their Q1 and Q2 2025 results were slight misses against consensus EPS.

Manulife Financial (MFC) Fiscal Q2 2025 Earnings Summary

Manulife Financial reported its fiscal Q2 2025 results on August 6, 2025. The results showed a mixed picture: strong underlying business momentum across key segments was partially offset by specific headwinds, leading to a slight miss on analyst consensus for Core Earnings per Share (EPS).

Key Financial Highlights (Q2 2025 vs. Q2 2024)

Segment Performance Snapshot

Asia Segment: Continued to be the primary engine of growth, with Core Earnings up 13% and New Business Value (NBV) up 28%. Sales momentum remained strong, particularly in Hong Kong and other Asian markets.

Global Wealth and Asset Management (GWAM): Delivered double-digit Core Earnings growth of 19%, supported by a significant increase in net inflows ($0.9 billion vs. $0.1 billion a year ago) from the Retirement and Institutional segments.

Canada Segment: Posted solid Core Earnings growth of 4%.

U.S. Segment: Experienced a significant headwind, with Core Earnings falling 53%. This was primarily due to two factors: unfavorable life insurance claims experience (elevated large-policy claims) and strengthened expected credit loss (ECL) provisions.

Strategic Highlights

Acquisition: Announced an agreement to acquire a 75% stake in Comvest Credit Partners, a move designed to add scaled private credit capabilities to the GWAM platform and support future growth.

Capital Strength: Maintained a strong capital position with a LICAT ratio of 136%.

Shareholder Return: Continued to return substantial capital to shareholders through dividends and share buybacks.

Lesson Learned from Q2 2025 Guidance

The primary lesson learned from the Q2 2025 report and subsequent commentary relates to the impact of exceptional, segment-specific volatility and the reaffirmation of long-term strategic targets.

1. The Core is Strong, but Volatility Hits Hard (The Nuance of Core EPS)

The Lesson: Investors must look beyond the headline Core EPS number and scrutinize the drivers of the result.

The overall Core EPS of $0.95 (+2% YoY) disappointed the market, leading to a stock price drop post-announcement.

Management's Guidance/Clarification: Management pointed out that Core EPS would have been up 7% if the impact of unfavorable U.S. mortality claims and strengthened Expected Credit Loss (ECL) provisions were excluded.

Investor Takeaway: While the one-time, non-recurring nature of the U.S. mortality claims was emphasized as "normal volatility" and not a fundamental deterioration, the quarter proved that even a diversified insurer is susceptible to significant temporary hits from claims experience or credit provisions, which can override strong performance in other segments (like Asia and GWAM).

2. Commitment to 2027 Strategic Targets Remains Unchanged

The Lesson: Management's guidance reaffirmed its confidence in the company's medium-term financial targets (2027), signaling that the Q2 headwinds did not affect the long-term strategic outlook.

Management's Guidance: The company stressed that the underlying business fundamentals (NBV growth, APE sales growth, and New Business Contractual Service Margin (CSM) growth) remained robust across all segments, which are the true indicators of future earnings potential under the new IFRS 17 accounting standard.

Investor Takeaway: This guidance teaches that strategic long-term growth metrics (like NBV and CSM) are more reliable indicators of Manulife's intrinsic value than quarterly Core EPS figures, which can be easily dampened by temporary experience losses. The strategic focus on high-potential businesses (Asia, GWAM, and the acquisition of Comvest) is the key driver for meeting the 2027 goals.

Key Metrics Investors Should Watch

Investors should focus on metrics that indicate the health of Manulife's key growth drivers, primarily its Asia and Global Wealth and Asset Management (GWAM) segments, and the impact of the interest rate environment.

1. Core Earnings and New Business Value (NBV)

Core Earnings (by Segment): Watch for performance in the Asia and U.S. segments. Asia has historically been a strong growth engine. Any deviation from expected performance in this region is a major market catalyst.

Note: Previous quarters showed mixed results in Asia, so strong year-over-year growth here would be a significant positive driver.

New Business Value (NBV): This metric reflects the profitability of new insurance policies sold and is a key indicator of the company's long-term growth and value creation potential.

2. Global Wealth and Asset Management (GWAM)

Net Inflows/Outflows: Look for continued positive net inflows into the GWAM business. This indicates asset management strength and is critical in a competitive environment.

Assets Under Management and Administration (AUMA): Growth in AUMA, driven by both market appreciation and net inflows, supports fee income.

3. Financial Strength and Capital

Life Insurance Capital Adequacy Test (LICAT) Ratio: This ratio is a measure of the company's financial resilience and ability to withstand adverse conditions. A strong LICAT ratio (typically above 140%) is crucial for regulatory confidence and potential capital deployment (share buybacks or dividend increases).

Book Value/Common Share: A key long-term valuation metric for financial companies.

4. Macro Environment & Interest Rate Sensitivity

Investment Spreads/Yields: As an insurer, MFC benefits from higher interest rates, which increase the yields on its bond portfolios. Management commentary on the impact of current interest rate environments on net interest margin and investment income will be vital.

Manulife Financial (MFC) Price Target

Based on 1 analysts from Tiger Brokers offering 12 month price targets for Manulife Financial in the last 3 months. The average price target is $32.02 with a high forecast of $32.02 and a low forecast of $32.02. The average price target represents a -4.16% change from the last price of $33.41.

Short-Term Trading Opportunities Post-Earnings

Trading around earnings is inherently high-risk, but opportunities for short-term gains or losses are often present due to volatility.

1. The "Surprise" Factor

The short-term stock movement will likely be driven by how much MFC's reported Core Earnings per Share (EPS) and New Business Value (NBV) deviate from the consensus estimates.

Positive Surprise (Beat): A significant beat on Core EPS and strong NBV, especially in the Asia segment, could lead to a short-term rally.

Negative Surprise (Miss): A miss, particularly if coupled with a weak outlook (revised forward guidance), could result in a sharp sell-off.

2. Forward Guidance

For short-term traders, the company's outlook or guidance for Q4 2025 and the full year 2026 is often more impactful than the past quarter's results. Positive forward guidance on earnings targets, capital deployment, or strategic progress (e.g., successful integration of recent acquisitions) could trigger upward momentum.

Trading Considerations

Recent Volatility: MFC's stock price response to recent earnings has been mixed, with a decline following the Q2 2025 report and a rise following the Q4 2024 report.

The options market overestimated MFC stocks earnings move 58% of the time in the last 12 quarters.The predicted move after earnings announcement was ±4.0% on average vs an average of the actual earnings moves of 3.7% (in absolute terms).

Implied Volatility: Options markets are pricing in an estimated 5.3% implied volatility (straddle) for the post-earnings move, suggesting the market expects a significant move in either direction.

Technical Setup: The stock has been trending upward since Q2 2025. Traders will be watching if the stock can break through its 52-week high (around $33.47 USD / $47.25 CAD) on a positive report or if it falls back to key support levels on a negative report.

Technical Analysis - Exponential Moving Average (EMA)

We can see that the bulls are getting the control and trying to make an upside continuation, with a positive RSI momentum remaining positive, we might be able to see interest build up ahead of its earnings, as investors might consider MFC to be one of the stock to use to hedge against a potential AI bubble.

I would be monitoring the price action and see if there is any changes in the investors sentiment, before thinking to enter a trade on Wednesday.

Summary

Manulife Financial is scheduled to report its Q3 2025 earnings on November 12, 2025, with the current analyst consensus EPS forecast at $0.74.

The analysis suggests a focus on the following key metrics:

• Core Earnings by Segment: Scrutiny will be on the Asia segment for continued strong growth and the U.S. segment to see if the unfavorable claims volatility that impacted Q2 has subsided.

• New Business Value (NBV): This is a critical indicator of long-term profitability and underlying business health. Continued double-digit growth is expected.

• Global Wealth and Asset Management (GWAM): Positive net inflows and growth in AUMA are essential to support fee income.

• Capital Strength: Investors will monitor the LICAT ratio for capital deployment potential (buybacks or dividends).

Short-Term Trading: The stock is likely to be volatile. A short-term trading opportunity exists if the Core EPS and NBV significantly beat consensus, or if the management provides upbeat forward guidance, which would support a rally. Conversely, an earnings miss or new unexpected operational headwinds could trigger a sharp pullback.

Appreciate if you could share your thoughts in the comment section whether you think MFC would be a good stock to use to hedge against a potential AI bubble.

@TigerStars @Daily_Discussion @Tiger_Earnings @TigerWire @MillionaireTiger appreciate if you could feature this article so that fellow tiger would benefit from my investing and trading thoughts.

Disclaimer: The analysis and result presented does not recommend or suggest any investing in the said stock. This is purely for Analysis.