Assurant Inc. (AIZ)

All Comments on AIZ

  • commenter
    sunrises
    Mar 06 02:06 PM
    Stocks with Biggest Change in Short Interest [view article]
    Perhaps, it's time for VMWare (VMW) to move out of it's wood shed and back onto the playing field. Gregory Ness outlines how the company offers its protection along with it's teammates such as Symantics, Mcafee & Checkpoint. Vmsafe initiative, a milestone, is making a difference. Institutions appear to be buying. Finally - we'll see it's return! Reply
  • commenter
    abcde_98
    Mar 06 09:03 AM
    It's Time to Break Up AIG [view article]
    David, so you have been reading the Yahoo message boards. Why not cut & paste some of what I've written there regarding splitting up the company, enterprise risk management, etc.
    On the Yahoo message board, it was an eye opener to read of another aspect of the mortgage industry -- the appraisals themselves and how companies like an AIG (and others), can play hard ball / bully the appraisors and their firms. As the mortgage industry is scrutinized further perhaps issues like this will become more apparent and the "bully" advantage will decline.

    Years ago there was talk in the industry of some insurers making money by not paying claims (or significantly delaying). Some other companies made money through "float" (accepting money as an intermediary and then holding it for a little while before paying it over to the party it should go to). How much additional income is still generated by the insurance industry through such practices?

    Where was the ERM? Derivatives? that are illiquid? There is always a winner and loser with derivatives. Sure, just keep taking one side of a derivative trade, oh and be sure not to protect against losses through purchase of a security at, say, a 10% loss level. Oh, we never thought about it? Oh, there is no one offering that type of derivative of the magnitude of our portfolio? Oh, PwC said we had a material weakness because we did not record the credit quality of the business underlying the derivatives - who needs to know that? Oh, forget Kevin Costner, we are the Untouchables.

    The competitive advantages that this company once had have been and continue to erode, just like the US dollar.
    Reply
  • commenter
    WAKEUP
    Feb 29 02:51 PM
    It's Time to Break Up AIG [view article]
    "Can anyone inside AIG understand all the exposures that they face?" Somebody MAY be able to understand all the exposures they face, but, it's probably only a chosen few, and they seem to PREFER it that way. Some years ago, while I was a territory manager, at AIG, I tried to explore the full role of Starr Technical Risks Agency, Inc. ("Starr Tech," as the AIG insiders refer to it) in the overall hierarchy of AIG. I was told, RUDELY, by the regional Starr Tech manager that Starr Tech's role was known to Starr Tech management, and that Starr Tech's management was the ONLY group that NEEDED to know. Months later, an AIG Senior Vice President mentioned to me that he had been told of my curiousity about Starr Tech, and that it was "probably best not to go asking that kind of questions." The Starr Tech secrecy was not the only "unmentionable&qu... area within AIG, but it's a good example of how difficult it is even for management level employees to find out what the company is really all about. Would AIG knowingly HIDE important information, from outsiders? WHAT DO YOU THINK?
    Reply
  • commenter
    User 158670
    Feb 29 09:28 AM
    It's Time to Break Up AIG [view article]
    mature adult - you miss the point here. you need - literally - a magnifying glass to see all of the different business enterprises this company has created over the years. it is out right labyrinthian. one of the purposes of this structure was to maintain the all roads lead back to Hank concept. he literally was the ultimate authority over any capital decision. absent Greenberg, the company fell into disarray because Greenberg was AIG. the company never was the product of talent and seasoned management. ask anyone to what extent the company succeeds at grooming, training and empowering management? they deserve to be broken up. it's also a company that fails to pay which was Greenberg's philosophy, focused on reducing expense. the immediate casualty was that it is a disincentive to stay there. AIG was and is a stepping stone in one's career. I find it ironic that most of Greenberg's wealth now is tied to a company over which he exercises no control. my bet is that Starr will make a bid for pieces of the company and it will be broken up. AIG was good at making easy money but never groomed the real investing skills that will be required to compete in the current environment - and I do mean insurance as well as the investment management business. Reply
  • commenter
    mature adult
    Feb 29 06:17 AM
    It's Time to Break Up AIG [view article]
    First loss in how many years and it's time to break up the company? Come on. Reply
  • commenter
    User 158526
    Feb 28 10:11 PM
    Stocks with Biggest Change in Short Interest [view article]
    Novice question...whom releases those Short Interest numbers and where might I view them directly on a bi-monthly basis? Thanks Reply
  • commenter
    Harmony
    monkey
    Feb 09 02:54 PM
    At These Prices, It's Time to Go Overweight Quality Financials [view article]
    Please read Nouriel Roubini...... Reply
  • commenter
    Kunst
    Jan 16 02:06 AM
    Five Solid Financial Stocks [view article]
    On 1/14/08, I bought calls of Wells Fargo (WFC) for February at $30 and April at $35. The stock was selling for $28.21 at the time. Reply
  • commenter
    Golf Club
    Rental
    Dec 17 05:35 PM
    My Website
    Housing Bubble and Real Estate Market Tracker [view article]
    If you are down on golf course real estate stocks, check out golfrentalandsales.com. It caters to golf courses, though is more in tuned to the rental markets.

    It is an up and coming play in this sector. Great cashflow, and strong management team.

    - Elijah
    golfclubrentals.blogsp...     Reply
  • commenter
    Golf Club
    Rental
    Dec 17 05:35 PM
    My Website
    Housing Bubble and Real Estate Market Tracker [view article]
    If you are down on golf course real estate stocks, check out golfrentalandsales.com. It caters to golf courses, though is more in tuned to the rental markets.

    It is an up and coming play in this sector. Great cashflow, and strong management team.

    - Elijah
    golfclubrentals.blogsp...     Reply
  • commenter
    tech man
    Nov 27 08:27 AM
    My Website
    Russell 1,000's Best, Worst Performers Since the 10/9 Top [view article]
    good up to date articles. Reply
  • commenter
    mlimberg
    Nov 12 07:26 PM
    Housing Bubble and Real Estate Market Tracker [view article]
    At the peak of the market in 1991, property in Japan was worth four times the value of all property in the US – on paper anyway.
    Buoyed by low interest rates, financiers introduced the concept of intergenerational loans, and eased credit standards as a way of helping people attain the booming prices.
    Every day investors were caught up in the mania. Many salarymen, fearing they'd be priced out of the market as it continued higher, bought properties they knew they couldn't afford, in the hope that price increases would wipe away their folly.
    Between 1989 and 1990 the Bank of Japan became worried that the property boom was becoming a bubble and took preventative steps, tightening interest rates. The bubble popped.
    The resulting bust saw housing prices fall for 14 years in a row, and prices retreated as far as 60 per cent in Japan's capital cities.
    The stockmarket crashed 80 per cent, consumers slowed their spending and the economy plunged into a prolonged recession.
    Daisuke Sato was one bloke I met who was caught in the crash. He bought an apartment in 1990 for (roughly) $500,000, and 17 years later the pad is worth only $280,000.
    Sato has a constant reminder of the mania – a massive mortgage that needs to be paid back regardless of the price of his home.
    Reply
  • commenter
    Josh Stern
    Jul 18 08:54 AM
    Assurant Down 10% - Good Buying Opportunity [view article]
    This stock looks very cheap. However, recently I've looked at other insurers who also look very cheap and have similar looking charts. Each company with a stock falling off a cliff has some individual issues which may or may not be material to future earnings, but I have to think that the common factor explaining no bids for all of them is worries about their investment portfolios of fixed income and high yield equity. Reply
  • commenter
    FIG trader
    Jul 05 05:19 PM
    My Website
    Insurance Stocks: Shooting Down An Overwrought Valuation Metric [view article]
    Spehar's argument (in his 6/28 piece) that using a DCF (intrinsic value) model would have generated higher returns (versus p/e or regressed ROE-price/book) is a bit specious. Over longer periods of time (he selected 2002 to 2006), using DCF (i.e or FCF_free cash flow or distributable dividends from insurance subs) and earnings should be the same, the difference is only a time lag between stat and GAAP earnings, for the most part. He is a card carrying member of the sellside set and one in good standing. He well knows that analysts will trot out any nonsense to justify their price targets (aggressive or too conservative), regardless of what conviction they have in the underlying assumptions. Its conviction on the stock (and management) that drives the recommendations and gets analysts to tweak the estimates and projections north or south. Who would naively believe that analysts have the know how (absent management guidance) to make detailed Statutory (i.e cash earnings) assumptions, given limited quarterly availability of data? Why he would attempt to make a point where none needs to be made is beyond me. The reason some people (I for one) like to focus on ROE/price book has more to do with potential risk/reward than trying to figure out which "supposed strategy" works better over time. The variability in book value for insurers from quarter to quarter is minimal, while a big earnings miss distorts the whole p/e measuring mechanism, without affecting the price/book materially (it does affect that quarters ROE which is why smoothed ROEs over numerous quarters are better) Lets take Ed Spehar's only ""sell" rating UNM, a rating I believe he has consistently maintained through thick and thin (from mid teens to 11 and all the way up thropugh to the current 26). It has had a low price book (for years it traded at a discount), with a modestly rising ROE, which he assumed couldn't be increased. The idea for analysts was to identify the transition point for this company, and the beginning of the ascent in the forward ROE or EPS. If you did the price/book would follow higher. Those that did were rewarded. Or lets take another favorite stock with a high price/book,uh......FMD comes to mind first. Its not that the DCF, P/E or Price/book strategies are better. Its that nobody knows where 2008/2009/2010 ROEs will be, but there is a unusually high probability that the ROE would be lower, and that the price/book would follow. Hence my January short call (historic was the way I put it) Reply

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