American Financial Group, Inc.

Is American Financial Group publicly traded?
Yes. It trades on the NYSE under ticker AFG.

Who owns AFG?
It is publicly traded, but the Lindner family holds a substantial stake and supplies both co-CEOs, Carl Lindner III and Craig Lindner.

What is Great American Insurance Group?
AFG's operating insurance brand, comprising 36 specialty property and casualty businesses.

When was American Financial Group founded?
1959, by Carl H. Lindner Jr. as American Financial Corporation.

Where is AFG headquartered?
Cincinnati, Ohio.

Carl H. Lindner Jr. built the company from a Cincinnati savings and loan operation started in 1959 as American Financial Corporation. Over the following decades he assembled a diversified financial empire spanning insurance, banking, and investments, taking the company private in the 1980s before returning it to public markets.

The insurance identity crystallized around Great American Insurance Company, whose own roots reach to 1872. Under Lindner the group expanded through dozens of specialty P&C acquisitions, each kept as a distinct underwriting business rather than merged into a monolithic carrier.

Carl Lindner Jr. died in 2011, and his sons Carl III and Craig assumed co-CEO leadership, maintaining the family's decentralized operating philosophy and conservative balance sheet. The family retains a substantial ownership position, unusual for a company of this size.

The 2020s have been a period of consistent specialty-market performance: strong underwriting profitability, disciplined investment returns from an in-house team, and steady book value growth punctuated by the family's trademark special dividends.

The company reports on responsible investment practices, underwriting risk management, and community engagement centered on Cincinnati, where it is among the city's largest employers and most prominent civic institutions.