AXA prepares €2 billion rights issue

by Gill Montia

Story link: AXA prepares €2 billion rights issue

AXA is reported to be preparing a €2 billion rights issue that will allow the insurer to expand through acquisitions.

However, the group’s Australian subsidiary, AXA Asia Pacific, has just rejected a $10 billion bid from its French parent company and Sydney-based competitor, AMP.

AXA Asia Pacific has independent board directors and the joint offer, which would have given AMP the Australasian businesses and AXA SA the Asian Pacific businesses, was considered too low.

In other AXA news, the insurer will be stress-tested by the Committee of European Insurers and Occupational Pension Supervisors, before the end of the year.

The body has said it will run an EU-wide stress test “for large and important insurance groups” and aims to deliver its findings to EU ministers during the first quarter of 2010.

The exercise, which will focus on market and credit risks, aims to increase the level of aggregate information among policy makers in assessing the European insurance sector’s potential resilience to shocks.