Primerica Clashes With Blogger Over Short Call

Primerica is fending off an attack from The Bear Cave, a blog with 62,000 subscribers that covers problems at publicly traded companies.

Edwin Dorsey, the blog’s editor, suggested in an article posted Thursday that the Duluth, Georgia-based life insurer uses high-pressure sales tactics and questionable sales accounting figures.

Primerica put out a statement describing Dorsey as a “blogger who published a misleading opinion about Primerica with the intend to drive down its stock price.”

“Their assertions and conclusions about Primerica are false,” Primerica said. “They do not accurately portray what Primerica’s licensed sales force does every day to assist middle-income families.”

What it means: Bloggers, short-sellers and activist shareholders seem to be focusing more on life and annuity issuers these days.

That could increase the insurers’ executives’ level of stress but eventually increase investors’ interest in the stock.

The blog article: Dorsey, who graduated from Stanford in 2020, said he based his article on materials such as a recorded Zoom presentation from a national sales director, a text message and agent presentations that emphasize the importance of recruiting other agents.

Primerica’s shares were selling for more than $213 each before the article came out, then fell more than 10%, to less than $190, before bouncing back to more than $214 per share at the close of trading Friday.