Regulators consider removing AIG’s ‘too big to fail’ designation: Reports

The Financial Stability Oversight Council is reportedly considering removing American International Group Inc. from its list of “too big to fail” nonbank financial institutions, according to Bloomberg.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is presiding over an executive session of the FSOC at the Treasury Department on Friday, according to a statement released by the department on Thursday. The preliminary agenda includes consideration of the council’s 2018 budget and an update on the annual re-evaluation of the designation of a nonbank financial company, according to the statement.

The company was not named in the statement, but Bloomberg is reporting it is New York-based AIG.

The FSOC has the responsibility of evaluating companies and has used it to designate four nonbank institutions as systemically important financial institutions, including AIG and Newark, New Jersey-based Prudential Insurance Co.

In December 2014, the council voted to designate New York-based MetLife Inc. as a SIFI, but the insurer won a court challenge against the designation in March 2016 after U.S. District Judge Rosemary M. Collyer in the District of Columbia found the FSOC’s SIFI determination “fatally flawed.” 

The House Financial Services Committee has made similar arguments in support of a legislative proposal to eliminate the controversial “too big to fail” designation for nonbank financial institutions, such as insurers. 

A Treasury Department spokesperson could not be immediately reached for comment while AIG declined to comment.