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Monday 2 March 2009

AIG lost $62 billion last quarter

Which makes over $100 billion of losses so far. The following gem was worth noting.

AIG Financial Products Corp. (AIGFP) net operating results for 2008 include the effect of changes in credit spreads on the valuation of its assets and liabilities since AIGFP elected to account for most of its financial assets and liabilities at fair value upon the adoption of FAS 159 on January 1, 2008. Previously, these effects were only recognized in earnings once realized upon a sale, maturity, impairment or termination. AIGFP, which is in the process of winding down its businesses and portfolios, contributed $17.2 billion to the Financial Services loss, primarily from the unrealized market valuation losses on its super senior credit default swap portfolio and credit valuation adjustments.

Translation: We used to hide all the bad news about our credit derivatives until they expired, probably hoping that the markets wold move back in our favour or that the "credit events" didn't happen. We don't do that now because the auditors found out about it.

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