In their recently-announced fourth-quarter earnings report, both Prudential Financial Inc.’s financial-services business as well as Allstate Corp showed a welcome swing to profits.

However, while the earnings of Allstate, US’ leading publicly-held personal-lines insurer - surpassed analysts’ expectations; those of Prudential, the country’s second-ranking insurer, happened to be weaker than projected and, as such, disappointed some analysts.

Nonetheless, noting that the company had hit the top end of its December outlook for the quarter, Prudential’s spokesman Bob DeFillippo said: “We believe we hit our numbers. We aren't sure how analysts missed it.”

Statistics revealed that Allstate reported a fourth-quarter profit of $518 million, or 96 cents per share – its earlier-year same quarter witnessed a $1.13-billion, or $2.10 per share, loss. Meanwhile, Prudential posted a $1.79-billion, or $3.79 per share, quarterly profit, vis-à-vis its year-before loss of $1.66 billion, or $3.89 per share.

A large part of Prudential’s quarterly profit came from the sale of its securities brokerage joint venture stake to Wells Fargo & Co.

However, saying that Prudential is winning business from rivals weakened by the tumultuous financial markets, the company’s Chairman and CEO John Strangfeld said in a statement that though the company was aware that uncertainty still persists, “we have never felt better about our balanced mix of quality businesses, and our ability to benefit from further changes in the industry landscape.”