The impact of the subprime crisis
As for insurers the United States
AIG . America's largest insurer, AIG ( American International Group ), was hit hard by the first financial crisis of 2008/2009, posting an abysmal loss of $ 99.3 billion for 2008. However, AIG was saved from bankruptcy by the contribution of 182 billion dollars from the American central bank ( Federal Reserve Bank ), which now holds 80 % of its capital. To reimburse this sum, AIG had undertaken to sell various assets, in particular the control of its life insurance subsidiaries and its non-life insurance business, in order to refocus on its other non-life insurance. In 2010, AIG listed its Asian life insurance subsidiary American International Assurance on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, and sold its American lifeinsurance subsidiary Alico to its competitor MetLife for $ 16.2 billion. of dollars. In 2011, AIG and the US Treasury Department jointly sold shares in the insurer for $ 8.7 billion.
Subprime , securitization , hedge funds and Cies . The collapse of AIG was not linked to its insurance activities, but to its financial activities within the framework of complex arrangements victims of the rout of the American real estate ( subprime ). Indeed, AIG Financial P roducts had invested more than 1 600 billion in toxic products such as commercial paper backed by mortgage loans (Collateralized Mortgage Obligations, CMOs), escaping effective control. We know that these receivables were grouped together in lots (securitization), sold to ad hoc companies (pension funds, speculative investment fundscalled hedge funds, etc.), then acquired by various investors in the financial markets. . The securities of these investors lost all value when households were unable to repay monthly payments on their variable rate loans and resell their homes. These toxic assets have often been acquired by US insurance companies, either directly or through alternative management subsidiaries that have created investment funds or taken control of existing funds.
It should be added that the very insurance activity of AIG remained profitable in the field of damage insurance, life insurance and auto insurance. On the other hand, the insurance activity of AIG still had to suffer the repercussions of the financial crisis, since this insurer had placed insurance contracts whose purpose was to guarantee policyholders against speculative risks and even against speculative risks. business bankruptcies.
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