Su Aegon
Abbiamo assistito, recentemente, ad una buona performance sia dell'azione che di alcune perp di Aegon. Eppure, la società non ha ancora risolto tutti i suoi problemi, come ci dice l'articolo che riporto qui sotto, del 25 febbraio scorso. A meno che....
Aegon Not Out of the Woods Yet
By HESTER PLUMRIDGE
Aegon is a reminder the financial crisis ravaged Europe's insurers as well as its banks.
The Dutch life insurer surprised the market Thursday by raising €900 million ($1.24 billion) to repay the last of €3 billion in state aid it received in 2008. That's a positive step toward putting its business on a more normal footing. But Aegon's path to rehabilitation won't be easy.
Precrisis, Aegon's €24 billion market capitalization ranked it among Europe's bigger insurers. Its TransAmerica Life subsidiary remains one of the U.S.'s largest life-insurance providers. But in 2008, losses on investments in U.S. financials left huge dents in Aegon's capital base, bringing its shares down 70% and pushing it into a government bailout.
Aegon has since made good progress reducing its equity exposure and exiting capital-intensive businesses to release funds to repay the state. The market believed it could fund most of a final €2.25 billion state-aid payment due this summer through internal resources, including via the sale of its life-reinsurance business, TransAmerica Re. But while Aegon says it is now in discussions with a prospective buyer, negotiations appear to be bogged down by its complex legal structure and concerns over the quality of its back book.
Under the circumstances, Aegon's decision to raise the maximum 10% of share capital authorized under the terms of a shareholder agreement in October looks sensible. Aegon's 198% solvency ratio, a measure of its capital relative to premiums written, looks adequate. But the repayment of state aid will reduce it, unless Aegon can make further divestments or generate cash from elsewhere in the business. And insurers such as the U.K.'s Prudential operate with solvency ratios much higher than 198%.
But the capital increase won't help solve Aegon's other major problem: Its return on equity at just under 10% is below the 12%-13% European insurance industry average, and could fall further as it deleverages. Aegon's capacity to redeploy cash from its U.S. operations into relatively small emerging-market businesses, where it would like to expand, also is limited.
Trading at just 70% of Aegon's tangible net asset value, its shares are hardly expensive when compared with European peers trading at about 150%. But the larger-than-expected capital raising is a reminder that Aegon still faces a long road back to health.
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