Japanese insurers are playing with fire

Ian Brimecome, the most senior foreigner in the Japanese insurance industry, calls time on peers’ reckless foreign forays.

Hired hand turned inside man, Ian Brimecome has seen what happens when Japanese insurance companies start making risky investments bankruptcies.

As an MA banker in the 1990s he advised on numerous takeovers of failed Japanese insurers. Each went under as a result of investments made to offset negative spreads, the gap between income and returns on guaranteed insurance policies.

He is feeling a case of déjà vu coming on.

“There is a lot more aggression out there, which last time brought me a lot of attractive MA fees when I spent my time rescuing the people who had gone too far,” Brimecome...

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