Insurance

As part of its Request for Comment entitled Expanding Recovery Rating Coverage And Enhancing Issue Ratings dated October 4th 2006, Standard & Poor’s Rating Services announced its intention, subject to market feedback and sufficient data, to publish recovery ratings on sub-investment grade insurance companies globally. In practice, most sub-investment companies are concentrated in the United States, and not all of those have issued debt. However, as part of the broader roll-out of recovery ratings (please refer to Background section for more details) we are currently assessing the demand for- and feasibility of publishing recovery ratings. In addition, research is being done in the reinsurance sector to develop a form of recovery rating for companies in run-off. We expect to announce more about this initiative later in 2007.

For more information contact:
Bob Swanton: +1 (212) 438 7404
Laura Feinland Katz: +1 (212) 438 7893