Financial services company Equitable Holdings (NYSE: EQH) reported Q1 CY2026 results exceeding the market’s revenue expectations, with sales up 11.8% year on year to $4.23 billion. Its non-GAAP profit of $1.62 per share was 0.7% above analysts’ consensus estimates.

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“We reported solid first quarter results with Non-GAAP operating earnings per share of $1.62, or $1.68 excluding notable items, up 25% from the prior year quarter. Within our businesses, we continued to see healthy organic growth momentum, highlighted by $1.3 billion of net inflows in Retirement and $2.0 billion of advisory net inflows in Wealth Management. Looking forward, we remain confident in achieving our 2026 guidance of $1.8 billion of cash generation and over 15% growth in earnings per share,” said Mark Pearson, President and Chief Executive Officer.

Company Overview

Tracing its roots back to 1859 as one of America's oldest financial institutions, Equitable Holdings (NYSE: EQH) provides retirement planning, asset management, and life insurance products through its two main franchises, Equitable and AllianceBernstein.

Revenue Growth

In general, insurance companies earn revenue from three primary sources. The first is the core insurance business itself, often called underwriting and represented in the income statement as premiums earned. The second source is investment income from investing the “float” (premiums collected upfront not yet paid out as claims) in assets such as fixed-income assets and equities. The third is fees from various sources such as policy administration, annuities, or other value-added services. Over the last five years, Equitable Holdings grew its revenue at a sluggish 3.4% compounded annual growth rate. This fell short of our benchmark for the insurance sector and is a tough starting point for our analysis.

Long-term growth is the most important, but within financials, a half-decade historical view may miss recent interest rate changes and market returns. Equitable Holdings’s annualized revenue growth of 5.3% over the last two years is above its five-year trend, which is encouraging. Note: Quarters not shown were determined to be outliers, impacted by outsized investment gains/losses that are not indicative of the recurring fundamentals of the business.

This quarter, Equitable Holdings reported year-on-year revenue growth of 11.8%, and its $4.23 billion of revenue exceeded Wall Street’s estimates by 8.6%.

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Book Value Per Share (BVPS)

Insurance companies are balance sheet businesses, collecting premiums upfront and paying out claims over time. The float–premiums collected but not yet paid out–are invested, creating an asset base supported by a liability structure. Book value per share (BVPS) captures this dynamic by measuring these assets (investment portfolio, cash, reinsurance recoverables) less liabilities (claim reserves, debt, future policy benefits). BVPS is essentially the residual value for shareholders.

We therefore consider BVPS very important to track for insurers and a metric that sheds light on business quality because it reflects long-term capital growth and is harder to manipulate than more commonly-used metrics like EPS.

Equitable Holdings’s BVPS declined at a 1.7% annual clip over the last five years. However, BVPS growth has accelerated recently, growing by 269% annually over the last two years from $1.43 to $19.56 per share.

Key Takeaways from Equitable Holdings’s Q1 Results

We were impressed by how significantly Equitable Holdings blew past analysts’ revenue expectations this quarter. On the other hand, its EPS slightly beat. Overall, this print had some key positives. The stock traded up 2.2% to $42.42 immediately following the results.

Is Equitable Holdings an attractive investment opportunity at the current price? The latest quarter does matter, but not nearly as much as longer-term fundamentals and valuation, when deciding if the stock is a buy. We cover that in our actionable full research report which you can read here (it’s free).