Aizawa hints at reviewing way to calculate insurers' health+.

TOKYO, Nov. 29 Kyodo

Japan's top financial regulator on Wednesday hinted at reviewing the method of calculating a key gauge of insurance companies' financial health.

''We'll make efforts to make it a more reliable measure,'' Hideyuki Aizawa, head of the Financial Reconstruction Commission, told the House of Representatives committee of finance.

Aizawa was speaking of a solvency margin, a key gauge of an insurer's ability to pay out policy obligations in the event of a disaster.

According to financial regulators, a solvency margin of 200% is seen as the minimum healthy level for life insurers.

The solvency margin of a life insurance company is roughly equal to the excess of the value of assets over the value of liabilities that is available to cover its required solvency margin.

At present, listed shares and unrealized gains or losses on land holdings are counted as assets.

Ichizo Miyamoto, the parliamentary vice minister in charge of financial reconstruction, told the same lower house committee that options under consideration include the one to count unrealized gains on bonds and foreign shares as assets.

Confidence in solvency margins have come into question since the collapse of two life insurance companies in October, Chiyoda Mutual Life Insurance Co. and Kyoei Life Insurance Co., as their solvency margins were above 200%.