NEW YORK (Standard&Poor's) Aug. 13, 2013--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services said today that it assigned its 'A-' senior unsecured debt rating to Lincoln National Corp.'s (LNC) proposed $300 million senior unsecured notes due 2023. LNC will use the proceeds from this issuance to prefund senior notes due in 2014. The debt rating reflects our 'A-' long-term counterparty credit rating on LNC, which is three notches lower than the ratings on the core operating companies (collectively, Lincoln Financial Group [LFG]), reflecting the holding company's structural subordination to its regulated insurance subsidiaries. In the past three years, LNC received annual dividends and interest on intercompany notes of around $0.8 billion-$1 billion from its insurance operating entities. LNC currently maintains cash
