Tops on new AIG boss’s agenda: Adriatic vacation
NEW YORK - Robert Benmosche, the chief executive of American International Group, plans to spend part of his first month leading the insurer in Croatia on vacation, according to two people familiar with the situation.
Benmosche, 65, who started Monday as chief executive and president of the company, will leave for about two weeks, according to one of the people, who declined to be identified because the plans were private. Mark Herr, an AIG spokesman, said the New York-based firm wouldn’t comment on travel.
“It’s probably not a propitious time for an incoming CEO to begin with a vacation,’’ said Steven Seiden, president of New York-based executive recruitment firm Seiden Krieger Associates. Seiden said that while the absence will not hurt the company’s financial position, “from a public relations standpoint it’s probably not the wisest thing to do.’’
Benmosche, named last week as AIG’s fifth chief executive since 2005, has to retain customers and employees to preserve the value of operations that will be sold to repay loans included in AIG’s $182.5 billion federal rescue. The insurer posted its first quarterly profit last week after more than $100 billion in net losses in the six prior periods, and said that subsidiaries “remain challenged.’’
The insurer’s top executives are available to the company by telephone and the Internet when they travel, according to a person familiar with AIG.
Benmosche bought a Croatian villa, with 8,000 square feet of living space located along the Adriatic Coast, after visiting Dubrovnik in 1999, according to a 2004 Forbes magazine article. He paid about $1 million for the property, which was built in 1934 for the king of Yugoslavia’s treasurer and included four buildings and 150 feet of waterfront, the magazine said.
Benmosche was chief executive of MetLife Inc., the largest US life insurer, for eight years through 2006.
Benmosche replaced Edward Liddy, who was appointed in September after AIG agreed to turn over a majority stake to the federal government in exchange for a bailout. Liddy, who returned AIG to profitability in the second quarter, was the face of the insurer during a period in which employees received death threats.
