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Bloomberg
Aflac Inc., the largest seller of supplemental health insurance, has started betting on infrastructure debt at its US and Japan businesses.
The insurer, which pushed into that asset class in the fourth quarter, invested $13 million in the debt last year at its Japan operation and $2 million at its US business, according to a regulatory filing. Aflac is working with a pair of third-party managers in the initiative, said a company spokesman who declined to identify the firms.
Chief Investment Officer Eric Kirsch, who was hired from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in 2011, has expanded into alternative assets to generate better returns on the insurer’s more than $110 billion investment portfolio and help counter low yields on bonds. The Columbus, Georgia-based company has said it would invest more in commercial loans and stocks, and last year reported that it was selling fixed-rate corporate bonds to help build an allocation to floating-rate loans. “We are actively engaged in both qualifying and starting the process of preparing to fund as good loans come our direction,†Chief Financial Officer Fred Crawford said about the switch trade this month on a conference call following fourth-quarter results.