Finance History | 11 Wall Street — Thirty-Six Dollars Turns a Mutual into ANTM

People treat Elevance Health as an Indianapolis insurer that always printed ELV on a finished managed-care book.

The October 2001 issuer was Anthem Inc., the stock parent of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc., a mutual converting to shareholder ownership.

The Hartford Courant recorded the debut on Tuesday 30 October 2001. The company sold 48 million shares at 36 dollars a share in 2001 currency, at the top of a 33-to-37 dollar range, and raised about 1.8 billion dollars.

The same paper said the stock closed at 40.90 dollars, up 4.90 dollars, on volume of more than 22.7 million shares. Larry Glasscock rang the closing bell.

A later federal opinion in the Southern District of Indiana confirmed those first-day figures and recorded that the underwriters' option lifted the cash offering to 55.2 million shares at the same 36 dollars.

The Plan of Conversion became effective on 2 November 2001. Eligible members received stock or cash for extinguished mutual interests. Anthem closed that effective day at 42.90 dollars.

The mechanism is a demutualization paired with a cash IPO. Policyholders were paid out as the public tape opened, rather than remaining the residual owners of a mutual.

On 28 June 2022 the successor changed its name to Elevance Health, Inc. and the ticker from ANTM to ELV.

The pin is the Broad Street facade of the Exchange. Interior trading is not visitable from the sidewalk.

Photo: Arild Vagen, August 2017, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. New York Stock Exchange from Broad Street.