Iowa Companies Total Pretax Earnings Were Down the Tubes During the Huge US Stock Market Rise of the Past Year. These Total Pretax Earnings Declined By 45% in the Most Recent 3Q of 2019 From the 3Q of 2018 and Declined By 22% in the Most Recent Four Quarters Combined From the Comparable Prior Year

From a review of SEC filings and Google Finance, I found 20 Iowa Headquartered Companies with stock markets caps of above $100 mil recently. 

My Focus is on Pretax Income rather than on After-Tax Net Income because Corporate Income Taxes are simply a transfer of financial wealth between US Corporations and the US Federal, US State and Foreign Governments.  It has nothing whatsoever to do with Company Operating Performance.

The table at the bottom below shows the Gold-Standard US GAAP Pretax Income (Loss) From Continuing Operations for the Third Quarter of both 2019 and 2018, the Second Quarter of both 2019 and 2018, the First Quarter of both 2019 and 2018, for the Fourth Quarter of both 2018 and 2017 and for the resultant Most Recent Four Quarters Combined and the Comparable Year's Four Quarters Combined for each of these 20 Iowa Companies.

Of the 2020 Democratic Presidential candidates running in the key Iowa primary, the only one of the candidates who has the strong financial acumen to be already aware of this bad economic news for Iowa is Pete Buttigieg.  When Company earnings collapse, there is no way non-executive employees will be getting fair wage and employee benefit increases.

And much more importantly, the only 2020 Democratic Presidential candidate running in the Iowa primary who has both the requisite financial acumen and the necessary economic fairness to help turn this unfortunate situation around where Iowa Companies and Iowa workers are both forgotten by nearly everyone in Washington DC is also Pete Buttigieg.

`														US	US
		US	US		US	US		US	US		US	US		GAAP	GAAP
		GAAP	GAAP		GAAP	GAAP		GAAP	GAAP		GAAP	GAAP		Pretax	Pretax
		Pretax	Pretax		Pretax	Pretax		Pretax	Pretax		Pretax	Pretax		Income	Income
		Income	Income		Income	Income		Income	Income		Income	Income		(Loss)	(Loss)
Iowa Companies		(Loss)	(Loss)		(Loss)	(Loss)		(Loss)	(Loss)		(Loss)	(Loss)		Most	Prior
Reporting Quarterly Earnings to SEC		Third	Third		Second	Second		First	First		Fourth	Fourth		Recent	Year
in Each of the Most Recent 4 Quarters		Quarter	Quarter		Quarter	Quarter		Quarter	Quarter		Quarter	Quarter		Four	Four
Market Caps Above $100 Mil	City HQs	2019	2018		2019	2018		2019	2018		2018	2017		Quarters	Quarters
		mils $	mils $		mils $	mils $		mils $	mils $		mils $	mils $		mils $	mils $
Des Moines Area Insurance Cos
Athene Holding Ltd	West Des Moines	279	679		750	321		740	322		(147)	487		1,622	1,809
Principal Financial Group	Des Moines	346	569		450	515		526	457		243	315		1,565	1,856
FGL Holdings	Des Moines	56	71		59	53		180	104		(199)	63		96	291
FBL Financial Group	West Des Moines	27	36		38	39		40	27		4	32		109	134
American Equity Investment Life	West Des Moines	51	208		23	114		(39)	178		66	108		101	608
Total 5 Des Moines Insurance Cos		759	1,563		1,320	1,042		1,447	1,088		(33)	1,005		3,493	4,698
….. % Change From Prior Year Qtr		-51%			27%			33%			-103%			-26%
All Other Iowa Companies
United Fire Group	Cedar Rapids	(5)	13		(5)	(2)		55	22		(42)	29		3	62
Casey's General Stores	Ankeny	108	91		112	89		30	19		54	26		304	225
Meredith	Des Moines	13	20		(9)	32		41	(126)		87	32		132	(42)
Heartland Financial USA	Dubuque	43	43		59	35		40	28		39	35		181	141
Winnebago Industries	Forest City	18	29		40	42		45	44		25	30		128	145
Heartland Express	North Liberty	27	26		30	23		22	13		30	10		109	72
Hills Nancorporation	Hills	15	13		14	13		14	13		7	13		50	52
MidWestOne Financial	Iowa City	16	9		14	10		9	10		9	1		48	30
West Bancorporation	West Des Moines	9	10		8	8		8	9		8	9		33	36
Ames National Corp	Ames	5	6		6	5		5	5		5	6		21	22
HNI Corp	Muscatine	58	51		21	24		2	1		42	(13)		123	63
Lee Enterprises	Davenport	3	5		8	7		(2)	3		15	16		24	31
Workiva	Ames	(16)	(11)		(8)	(22)		(7)	(10)		(8)	(14)		(39)	(57)
Flexsteel Industries	Dubuque	13	2		(26)	3		(20)	5		2	8		(31)	18
Renewable Energy Group	Ames	(14)	26		(58)	33		(42)	217		26	(11)		(88)	265
Total 15 All Other Iowa Cos		293	333		206	300		199	254		299	177		997	1,064
….. % Change From Prior Year Qtr		-12%			-31%			-22%			69%			-6%
Total all 20 Iowa Companiess		1,052	1,896		1,526	1,342		1,646	1,342		266	1,182		4,490	5,762
….. % Change From Prior Year Qtr		-45%			14%			23%			-77%			-22%

The huge Berkshire Hathaway Energy, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, is headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa.  I did not include it in the above table with the other 20 Iowa Companies because it does not have stock which trades.

However, it files its financial statements with the SEC.

Berkshire Hathaway Energy's Pretax Income was $851 mil in the 3Q 2019 as compared to $1,432 mil in the 3Q 2018, a decline of 41% which is consistent with the 45% decline of the other 20 Iowa Companies Combined in the 3Q 2019.