Conseco filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December 2002 after rapid expansion through acquisitions. The Indiana-based financial-services company had accumulated substantial debt while buying insurance and finance businesses.
Conseco’s problems reflected both an aggressive growth strategy and difficulty integrating acquired operations. Its bankruptcy was among the largest in American corporate history at the time, with billions of dollars in liabilities.
The company emerged from bankruptcy in 2003 and later changed its name to CNO Financial Group. It retained insurance and financial-services operations, but the restructuring substantially changed its business.
Conseco is sometimes confused with Enron or WorldCom, but those companies failed amid accounting scandals, whereas Conseco’s collapse centered primarily on debt, acquisitions, and financial-services difficulties.