This is a very interesting report released from the GAO…
The report notes that there is no comprehensive data for life settlements, but estimates that the market “grew rapidly from 1998 until the recent financial crisis.”
After increasing from 2006 to 2008, the number of policies settled declined in 2009, the report found. In 2009, over 2,600 policies were settled with a total face value of $7.01 billion, down from 4,505 in 2008. Policy owners were paid a total of $890 billion and brokers made $90 million in commissions from the sale of life settlements, in 2009. In 2008, the total value of policies settled was nearly $13 billion. Policy owners were paid more than $2 billion and brokers’ commissions were $280 million.
Life settlements are regulated by state insurance laws, which oversee the “front-end transaction,” or the sale of a policy by its owner to a provider; and by state and federal securities laws which regulate the “back-end transaction,” or the sale of the policy to an investor from the provider.
The life settlement market is organized largely as an informal network of specialized intermediaries that facilitate the sale of existing life insurance policies by their owners to third-party investors. Policy owners may sell their policies directly to investors in some cases, but owners and investors commonly use intermediaries to assist them with their life settlement transactions. Life settlement brokers represent policy owners for a fee or commission and may solicit bids for policies from multiple life settlement providers with the goal of obtaining the best price. Life settlement providers buy life insurance policies on behalf of investors for a fee or commission or for their own account. The number of brokers and providers varies widely from state to state
