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 | | From: | Edmund Fitzgerald | | Subject: | Oligopoly brief: Allianz | | Date: | Fri, 21 Jan 2005 22:04:03 -0500 |
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 | From:
http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2004/04/11.html
Oligopoly Watch
The latest maneuvers of the new oligopolies and what they mean
Sunday, April 11, 2004
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Oligopoly brief: Allianz
German Allianz is one of the world's biggest insurers. Because most
insurance companies combine finance with insurance, and because each company
specializes in some, but not all, kinds of insurance (life, property,
health, casualty, etc.), it's not easy to compare them, but Allianz is
definitely the leader in sales (though lately far from it in profit and
market capitalization), with fully multinational scope, with over 100
subsidiaries. It is #1 worldwide in property and casualty insurance.
As a financial institution, in light of its recent acquisition of Dresdner
Bank, it is #4 in the world. The company handles asset management for both
institutions and individuals, risk consulting, and public investment funds.
Allianz, like most big multinational companies, has been built up by a
series of mergers and acquisitions, along with organic growth. It was
founded in Berlin in 1890, and set up its first international branch office
(in London) in 1893. After World War II, the company moved to Munich (its
Berlin headquarters had been bombed). It slowly expanded its business and in
the 1980s started snapping up insurance companies in England, Italy, and
France. In 1990, it acquired the state insurance company of the former East
Germany.
A few of the more recent acquisitions include:
1997 Assurances Generales de France
1999 First Life Insurance (South Korea)
2000 Asset management company PIMCO Advisors (US)
2001 German Dresdner Bank (Germany)
2001 Nicholas-Applegate, an asset management company (US)
Allianz is reportedly just starting to dig out from the disastrous Dresdner
Bank acquisition, one that is losing well over a billion dollars a year. The
company's hidden problems became clear only after the acquisition, and it
came at a time, after terrorist attacks and some disastrous natural
occurrences, when Allianz's property and casualty divisions were not doing
so well either. Add to that a heavy investment in faltering German
industries. Dresdner Bank's problems were based on bad loans, and the
Allianz has suffered as it has written off the worst of them and tries to
restructure some of the others.
Under new leadership, the company has recently gone into the black this
year, but many of its divisions (banking, asset management, health) are
still losing money. The biggest plus came from the company's selling of some
of its interest in German personal care products company Beiersdorf (Nivea).
Allianz continues to expand its operations in China and in Eastern Europe.
It plans to sell more of its equity holdings in other companies and to keep
cutting costs and reorganizing its far-flung operations.
Principal divisions of Allianz
See:
http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2004/04/11.html
for table.
"Insurance" in the above table denotes a mix of property, casualty, life and
health.
Allianz also has major operations in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria,
Canada, China, Colombia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary,
Indonesia, Ireland, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland,
Portugal, Romania, Russia, Singapore, Slovakia, and Taiwan
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