Analysis

  • The sun shines again on Spanish general accounts

    08 May 2023

    As fixed income yields rise, Spanish insurers' CIOs may reflect happily on their 76% weighting to fixed interest interests - and smile again, David Walker writes

  • Bolting for the door - could 'mass lapse' risk trigger 'mass bond sales' at French lifers?

    04 May 2023

    Better interest rates mean better investment options than life policies. As France's exposed lifers watch on, some count up their liquid assets, some count on customer loyalty - but will all ultimately count on CIOs, to sell off GAs? David Walker reports

  • CNP Assurances in praise of an "all-terrain" investment strategy

    03 May 2023

    Chief investment officer Olivier Guigné, winner of this year's CIO of the year award from Insurance Asset Risk, talks macro economy, why no single scenario should now dominate a CIO's thinking, and why 2023 will be good for credit analysts - but bad for 'zombies'. Interview by Vincent Huck

  • How best to describe a stuff-up? SFCR writers confront Whitehall's gilts-storm

    01 May 2023

    Remember, remember the 23rd of September - when gilt yields exploded, without a mote of gunpowder in sight. David Walker reads how UK insurers revisited the scene in their SFCRs

  • How the matching adjustment has 'misfired' at many Spanish lifers

    27 April 2023

    The MA has saved UK lifers truly vast sums of Solvency II capital. In Spain it's delivered some very mixed outcomes, David Walker reports.

  • The real estate crisis is coming

    26 April 2023

    Stephen Quazzo, chief executive of real estate investment boutique Pearlmark, tells Sarfraz Thind that it is only be a matter of time before the bubble pops.

  • To go short or to go long? That is the question on CIOs' minds

    24 April 2023

    Unlike previous years where CIOs focused on capital preservation and the hunt for yield, 2023 will be marked by a focus on managing volatility and the duration gap.

  • German life CIOs breath out, as the 'great ZZR unwind' begins

    19 April 2023

    In past years, German lifers dispatched CIOs to raise cash to pay into their ZZRs - like it, or not. But that reversed, and sometimes heftily, as interest rates rose in 2022. David Walker reports

  • Thoughts from a CRO: the problem with CLOs

    17 April 2023

    Will the push into leverage now come back and bite the insurance investors who have been stocking up on CLOs and private credit? Quite possibly, according to Nick Silitch, ex-CRO of Prudential Financial.

  • CIOs face up to 'the day after the night before'

    12 April 2023

    The prolonged low-rates environment meant good times for real assets, and those borrowing to buy them. But as David Walker discovers, even good times must end

Most Read
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  3. NAIC takes aim at insurer investment subsidiaries
  4. The savings illusion: why Europe needs investment, not deposits - and the insurers' role
  5. Solvency II changes a "meaningful step" for securitised assets' allure, S&P says
  6. Expect lower growth in 2026 - but AI bubble not about to burst, Aviva Investors says
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  8. Private credit: are headline news and underlying performance one and the same?
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  10. Canada Life completes £330m buy-in with Comet pension scheme