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The announcement that American Home has filed for protection under US Insolvency law may be just the latest in a round of disastrous announcements that the markets are becoming desensitised to.

For American Home is not the first financial institution exposed to the increasingly disturbing sub-prime lending crisis.

Figures from the US Treasury last week showed that property repossessions are up 59% from a year ago. Yesterday, a large European institution - Swiss Re - published figures that showed its precise exposure to the US sub-prime market - USD600 million. What it did not say was whether that was total exposure or the expected failure rate.

American Home is symptomatic of the problem: all on its own, it has added to US unemployment figures by more than 6500 - as of Friday, it had only 750 staff remaining.

But more worrying is that American Home was not exclusively a sub-prime lender. It had a significant part of its mortgage book in supposedly prime lending. And that, too, has seen a rapidly increasing level of default.

The Chief Officers' Network and BISfaculty will hold "When America Sneezes..." a Pan Asian Conference in Singapore on 24 - 25 September 2007. See BISfaculty.Com for more information.

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