minnesota life insurance

The Minnesota Life Insurance Company was founded in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1880 as a mutual insurance company. It was originally organized as a mutual because a general distrust of stockholder-owned businesses prevailed at that time and there was a shortage of people willing to buy stock.

In 1998, Minnesota Life Insurance Company converted from a mutual to a stock company and concurrently established a mutual life insurance holding company. The company, in that process, became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Securian Financial Group, Inc.

The type of reorganization undertaken by Minnesota Life is not allowed in the state of New York, where attempts by mutual insurance to pass similar permissible legislation failed. Opponents of mutual insurance holding companies referred to it in New York as "legalized theft,” since the ownership interests of policy owners are extinguished without compensation. A03332-0905.