Jörgen Svensson, President of Länsförsäkringar Liv, comments on the Financial Supervisory Authority’s ruling regarding demutualisation to a profit-dis

Now that we have had time to study the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority’s ruling, we can state that our application for demutualisation was approved on all points except for one. This point concerns the valuation of unspecified assets that are not included in the balance sheet of the life-assurance company. We have continuously maintained the opinion that amounts belonging to customers should naturally accrue to customers in the event of demutualisation. The items that are not recognised at market value in the balance sheet are pension capital and surpluses. The amounts built up by the owners should accrue to the owners in the event of demutualisation. In other words, the values associated with share certificates belong to the holder of the share certificates, according to normal ownership rights. Previous demutualisations have also been managed in this manner and the Swedish government applied the same principle to the demutualisation of Handelsbanken. In addition, the lawyers and auditors we engaged as experts in the demutualisation process share our opinion. Given the Financial Supervisory Authority’s opinion with regard to crediting (distributing profits to policyholders) that was put forward in its ruling, we are neither able nor want to demutualise the company. We are now closely analysing the Financial Supervisory Authority’s ruling and once we have completed this process, we will decide what the next step will be. Appealing to the Administrative Court of Appeal is naturally one of the alternatives that we will consider. The Boards of both Länsförsäkringar Liv and Länsförsäkringar AB will, of course, now discuss this matter and decide on what future action to take