American International Group CEO Robert H. Benmosche says the company is moving on and still has plenty of top performers after losing a quartet of executives to Berkshire Hathaway.

“We're going to lose people to competitors from time to time,” he said during a conference call on AIG's first-quarter earnings. “Not everyone is going to be happy with the company as we go forward.”

“We have a deep bench,” he added.

AIG at the end of April lost Peter Eastwood, the head of AIG's U.S. P&C operations; David Bresnahan, president of AIG's Lexington unit; Sanjay Godhwani, president for Latin America and the Caribbean for AIG's P&C operations; and David Fields, another top P&C executive.

All landed at Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway.

Benmosche says AIG has retained 94 percent of the top-rated performers at the company.

“We still have a lot left,” he later told In The Loop with Betty Liu on Bloomberg TV.

AIG hired from within to fill the positions, except for Godwani's post, which has yet to be filled. Robert Schimek has become president and CEO of AIG Property Casualty's Americas region. Alexander Baugh assumed responsibility for AIG's global casualty business. Nicholas Walsh will become president and CEO of AIG's Europe, Middle East, and Africa region.

Benmosche said brokers and customers are satisfied with the promotions.

During the conference call Benmosche said AIG's competition is “struggling a little bit with their flows, and so they have to get in businesses they weren't in traditionally.”

On Liu's show he added that he was surprised Buffett “wanted to get into a business and wait for people to call,” adding a sarcastic “God bless him.”

Buffett told Liu Berkshire was going “full bore” into commercial insurance.

“We would like to get into commercial insurance very big time,” he said, adding the four AIG executives came to him and in fact some had been calling “for a long time.”

“We did not initiate anything,” Buffett said.

Special Reports /

Benmosche: AIG Has a 'Deep Bench'; Buffett: 'Full Bore' Into Commercial Insurance

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