Washington - American International Group Inc (AIG), the
troubled global insurance giant that helped send the financial
industry into a tailspin last September, is slowly being stabilized
and should not need any more government bail-outs, its chief
executive said Wednesday.
CEO Edward Liddy said 'substantial progress' had been made in
restructuring the company, but he left open the possibility of more
emergency loan requests if the US economy takes another turn for the
worse. The company has already received more than 180 billion dollars
over a series of government interventions.
'We are stabilizing AIG's liquidity so that we do not need support
beyond those amounts that the government has already authorized,
although as I have said before the state of the economy will be a
factor,' Liddy said in testimony before the House Oversight and
Government Reform Committee.
Liddy, who was made CEO only after AIG's near-collapse in
September, said the company had also 'reduced, but not yet
eliminated, the systemic risk that AIG presents to the global
financial system.'
AIG has posted hundreds of billions of dollars in losses due to
its exposure to the US mortgage market. The company insured mortgage-
backed securities held by US and global banks, which plummeted in
value as a US housing boom turned to bust in 2007.
The bail-out of AIG has become a major headache for President
Barack Obama, after it emerged in March that the company paid out
about 165 million dollars in bonuses to its executives after
receiving government funds.
The Washington Post on Wednesday reported that senior officials at
the Federal Reserve's regional bank of New York as well as members of
Congress knew of the planned bonuses more than five months before the
controversy erupted, but did not alert the Obama administration until
late February.
USA
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