AIG to jettison businesses

American International Group Inc. wants to sell a number of business lines, but intends to hang onto its core U.S. property and casualty insurance businesses, its foreign general insurance businesses, and its foreign life insurance business, chief executive Edward Liddy said in a conference call with analysts this morning. In his discussion of New York-based AIG’s future, Mr. Liddy failed to mention specifically its broker-dealers network, the AIG Advisor Group, which has close to 7,000 affiliated reps and advisers. Yesterday, investmentnews.com reported that the AIG Advisor Group would be included in AIG’s broad sale of assets. When asked to detail the business units AIG will shed, Mr. Liddy said, “Everything else that doesn’t fit.” He then added: “We have a preference for larger transactions. This is not a fire sale,” Mr. Liddy said. As of Sept. 30, AIG of New York had drawn $61 billion from an emergency loan the Federal Reserve made available to AIG last month. The Fed has extended credit of $85 billion to AIG. Larry Roth, CEO of the AIG Advisor Group, was not immediately available to comment on these developments Friday morning. The AIG Advisor Group consists of three firms: AIG Financial Advisors of Phoenix; FSC Securities Corp. of Atlanta; and Royal Alliance of New York.