AIG 2010 Annual Report Download - page 5

AIG 2010 Annual Report 3
In 2010, American International
Group began a transformation that
previously had been unimaginable.
We demonstrated the strengths of
AIG’s core businesses, which have
enabled us to remain market leaders.
Supported by our powerful culture
of entrepreneurism and innovation,
we retained and regained customers,
and grew our businesses. At the same
time, we worked with the U.S. govern-
ment to begin the process of repaying
American tax-
payers for their
unprecedented
nancial support.
Without a doubt,
2010 saw much
change at AIG
as we refocused
our energies and
resources, reduced
our size, rebuilt
our functions,
and uncovered signicant opportunities.
We had growth at Chartis and
SunAmerica Financial Group. Also,
United Guaranty Corporation (UGC),
our mortgage insurance business, and
International Lease Finance Corpo-
ration (ILFC), our aircraft leasing
business, have both rebounded and are
again self-supporting.
Our restructuring did result in some
asset sales – in particular, the sale of
ALICO and the IPO of AIA, with the
cash proceeds from those two business-
es going directly to repaying taxpayers.
But once it became clear that we didn’t
Letter to
Shareholders
Robert H. Benmosche
President and
Chief Executive Ofcer
AIG’s core
businesses, sup-
ported by our
powerful culture
of entrepre-
neurism and
innovation, have
enabled us to
remain market
leaders.
need to dismantle AIG to repay our
obligations, a foundation was laid for
the recapitalization of the govern-
ment’s ownership of the company. The
result is a simplied structure that will
enable the U.S. Treasury Department
to sell its AIG shares over time and for
AIG to emerge as a nancially strong,
redened, stand-alone company.
We also have made signicant progress
extracting value from other assets that
are no longer core to AIG’s operations,
but are still outstanding businesses
on their own. We rebuilt many of our
key functions in nance, enterprise
risk management, investments, human
resources, and technology, as well
as supporting AIG’s already strong
management team with a number of
key hires.
There is, however, still much work to
be done, and 2010 had its challenges.
AIG’s unique
business, much
of which we
pioneered in the
1960s, 1970s, and
1980s, created
unprecedented
growth for AIG,
but some of this
business has also
exposed AIG to new risks decades after
some policies were written. As illustrat-
ed by our decision to again strengthen
We rebuilt key
functions
in nance,
enterprise risk
management,
investments,
human resources,
and technology.