AIG’s Chief Risk Officer Retiring

AIG's Chief Executive Robert Benmosche in a letter to employees on Tuesday announced the retirement of the insurer's chief risk officer, Robert Lewis, who held the position for more than six years.

Source: Source: Dow Jones | Published on October 6, 2010

Benmosche said in the internal memo that AIG expects to name a successor "soon". "In the meantime, Bob has committed to remain with the company to ensure a smooth transition."

Lewis has been AIG's chief risk officer since July 2004, having been appointed to that role by then-Chief Executive Maurice R. "Hank" Greenberg. He kept the job under Greenberg's four successors, including through AIG's near-collapse and government bailout in 2008.

Lewis testified before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission at a hearing this past summer about AIG's risk-management policies in the years leading up to the company's near collapse. Lewis told the panel that AIG had an enterprise risk-management system at the corporate level, but, "as it turned out, we were wrong about how bad things could get. What ended up happening was so extreme that it was beyond anything we had planned for."

Benmosche hailed Lewis as "a true professional" whose "hard work, leadership and dedication have been invaluable to the organization through tumultuous times."