Covid-19 chaos drains Axa’s Solvency II ratio

French insurer Axa said its Solvency II capital ratio dropped 16 percentage points over the first quarter of the year to 182%, its lowest since the European Union-wide insurance regulatory framework came into force in 2016.

Axa said the decline resulted from the blow out of corporate and sovereign bond spreads over the first three months of the year as financial markets absorbed the economic impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as a drop off in interest rates.

The insurer also hinted the