Declarations

Spitzer’s Folly

“When (Eliot Spitzer) was attorney general he was on a witch hunt, he’d go after anyone he could to get headlines. I look at the pattern (at AIG) from when Hank Greenberg went out, not just the crisis now, and the stock plummeted. It cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars in our pension system.”

—New York Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, one of numerous lawmakers and insurance industry watchers who feel former Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is partly to blame for AIG’s current problems.

Somber Anniversary

“We are going to be hit at some point… the important thing is not to get complacent and do all the preparations that we need to do.”

—Rhode Island Gov. Don Caricieri, commenting on the 70th anniversary of the 1938 hurricane, one of the deadliest and most destructive in New England history. Emergency officials commemorated the anniversary last month by hanging blue banners at high water marks around Providence.

Flood of Relief

“While we would have preferred that Congress pass a long-term extension with much-needed reforms, it was vital to ensure that the National Flood Insurance Program would not lapse.”

—David Sampson, president of the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America, commenting on the passage of a 6-month extension for the National Flood Insurance Program. Lawmakers now have until March to hammer out any changes to the program.

Awaiting a Fire Sale

“Some of those units, most of those units, I believe, will be for sale over the next year or two, and we would be interested in a couple of them.”

—Billionaire Warren Buffet, owner of Berkshire Hathaway, commenting on the possibility of his buying AIG insurance subsidiaries. His Omaha, Nebraska-based holding company owns 76 businesses and stakes in dozens of companies, but generates about one-half of its business from insurance and reinsurance.

Insuring the Poor

“There is a vast unmet demand for insurance globally; the reality for the insurance industry is that growth will come from emerging markets especially – where most of the population is low-income. There is a tremendous opportunity to build profitable and sustainable businesses that at the same time protect low-income people and help them escape devastating poverty.”

—Andrew Kuper, founder and president of newly created LeapFrog Investments, a company that will specialize in offering insurance to poor residents of underdeveloped countries.