Above-Ground Nuclear Test Set for Peoria, IL
Associated Press
September 6th, 2010
Hartford, Connecticut--In a press release issued today, Aetna Insurance Company announced plans for an above-ground nuclear test in Peoria, IL next month, on either October 17th or 25th. The event, as well as final determination with regard to the actual date, is subject to approval by a vote of its Board of Directors to be held at an emergency meeting slated for this coming Friday, September 10th in Hartford.
"We're anticipating swift approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission, since it was determined that as a matter of national security--and everyone knows the well-being of our corporate-based economy supercedes all other matters, including life, itself--they would have final say on the issue, since we received authorization from Larry Summers to divert the regulatory authority for this event from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to a more appropriate entity," said Glenn Beck, Aetna's recently appointed corporate spokesperson...
Aetna's announcement stemmed from last year's efforts by Wall Street to enable an even greater level of financiallly-innovative products and services to enter the marketplace, including an expanded Wall Street foray into the
life settlements business--a practice whereby lenders advance a portion of the face value of life insurance settlements to policyholders before they die, see: "
Back to Business:
Wall Street Pursues Profit in Bundles of Life Insurance." (H-T to Naked Capitalism, see: "
Is Wall Street About To Ruin Another Financial Product (Life Settlements Edition)."
As a result of these new products entering the marketplace over the past year, an entirely new series of credit default swaps were issued based upon securitized portfolios that were floated in the financial markets to support them. Lending institutions have raised over two trillion dollars over the past twelve months via the issuance of a new product now known as the "Life-Backed Securitizations," or "LBS," which are, essentially, Wall Street bets based upon the life insurance industry's actuarial hopes that people will die on or before the population's average age of death.
Beck continued, "Aetna, like so many other insurance firms over the past year, based the future of its profit margins upon financial innovation. One arm of these innovative efforts--a series of products that the insurance industry heartily endorsed and embraced--was the life settlements trade. And, while this has been very successful, to date, allowing us to emerge from a virtual economic depression in just months, as opposed to the originally-projected decades that many pundits had forecasted it would take for the U.S. to regain its economic footing, the fact is that the effects of the H1N1 pandemic were just not as devastating as we had anticipated. So, to help level the playing field, and improve our bottom line, we thought a little thinning out of the population would be in order. We're starting with Peoria, since our actuarial team is telling us that--with an average life expectancy of 88 years and 7 months--it's one of our biggest problem areas."
When asked for comment, Sabrina Johnson, a spokesman foir the office of White House economics advisor Larry Summers replied: "Mr. Summers is currently on an insurance industry-sponsored junket to the far east. We'll issue a follow-up statment upon his return."
A company spokesperson explained that further details of Aetna's planned event, next month in Peoria, will be made public following their emergency Board Meeting on Friday.
In related news: the markets responded positively to Aetna's announcement today, pushing that stock's price up a whopping 14%, to $93.20.