Now the insurance market is suffering
As we suggested some time ago it looks as though it is the turn of the insurance sector to suffer from the fall in investment markets around the world. While the Association of British Insurers has intervened to try and calm investor nerves in some ways this has only highlighted the issue further.
Even though there does not appear to be any immediate threat to insurers in the UK there are grave concerns that increasing corporate defaults will soon catch up with both equity and bond investments which form the core of their asset bases. All of the major companies in the sector such as Prudential, Aviva and the likes of Old Mutual have been hit hard over the last few days and seem set to be in the limelight for some time yet. We have a similar situation to what we had in the banking sector with investors looking for the next failure and determined to flush out bad news in the process.
Even tough none of the majors have yet seen fit to reassure markets about their overall liquidity positions it seems only a matter of time before they release a response to the market.
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