No wonder the Prudential rejected Aviva's £17 billion takeover bid last year knowing they were sitting on orphan assets of nearly £9 billion within their inherited estate. So who does this belong to? We do agree not necessarily to the current crop of policyholders on a 90:10% basis as is usual with "with profit" fund distributions, because for example what claim can present day policholders possibly have on a policy taken out before the first World War, and the beneficiaries went missing somewhere down the line?
In the case of Aviva and Prudential leading adjudicators have been appointed to seek an equitable split of these funds between shareholders, and policyholders, and undoubtedly they must, and will take into account solvency margins, and we hope, they will take steps to avoid depleting funds so as to put existing policyholders at risk.
We will continue to monitor this "with profit" fund arena , and report on developments as and when.