Make a date in your diary for 8pm Tuesday, 7 August, for the BBC Radio 4 documentary ‘The Equity Release Trap’. The documentary investigates the claims of Professor Kevin Dowd, professor of finance and economics at the University of Durham, that the equity release sector has been seriously under-valuing embedded guarantees, and that the regulator, the Prudential Regulation Authority, has only made half-hearted attempts to address these under-valuations while permitting them anyway. The implications for some of the firms involved could be profound. Professor Dowd is interviewed in the programme, as is UKSA member Dr Dean Buckner, who worked as a valuation specialist at the PRA.
The UK Shareholders Association and ShareSoc will be issuing a press release to coincide with this programme.
Cliff Weight, Director, ShareSoc
There has been a lot of press and media comment today that may be of interest – see the below links to some of them.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44992836
https://www.ft.com/content/ee4a7466-9a12-11e8-9702-5946bae86e6d
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/equity-release-sector-is-in-deep-trouble-xn05c7v29