Your Financial Window

Amid confusion, surprise and fear, White tried to explain that the troubled USbased American International Group (AIG) had already been rescued by the US government.

He said all insurance companies under AIG have solid financial status.

"We're satisfied as it [financial status] has been positive all the time. There is only one part with a problem. I'm still feeling angry with the group of people who made AIG become like this. But the latest news is that the US government has appointed Ed [Edward Liddy] as new chief. He has been looking at key figures and will help analyse all the risks that AIG's former executives didn't see," White said.

According to Bloomberg, former Allstate Corp CEO Liddy was hired by the US government to run AIG as part of a plan to avert the collapse of the country's largest insurer.

Liddy, 62, was selected after discussions between regulators and AIG, said a person familiar with the matter, declining to be identified because there was no formal announcement. He replaces Robert Willumstad, who is leaving after AIG was forced to accept a US$85billion (Bt2.91trillion) federal loan and give the government a majority stake to stave off the biggest financial failure in history.

"He's a brilliant financial strategist,"' said Robert Pike, a retired chief administrative officer who reported to Liddy at Illinoisbased Allstate. "He's able to take an extraordinary amount of data and synthesise it, probably better than anybody I ever met."

Liddy led Allstate, the largest publicly traded US home and auto insurer, for eight years until 2006. He joined Allstate in 1994 to oversee the spinoff from retailer Sears Roebuck, where he had been chief financial officer.

He was elected a director at Goldman Sachs Group in 2003, when Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson was CEO of the New Yorkbased investment bank. Earlier this year, Liddy was named a partner at Clayton Dubilier and Rice, a private equity firm whose holdings include ServiceMaster and US Foodservice.

Liddy began an effort that continued under current Allstate CEO Tom Wilson to scale back the insurance cover of homes in catastro¬pheprone regions.