AIG has announced that Peter Zaffino (pictured, left) will step down as executive chair and as a member of the board of directors, effective September 15, 2026. He will become a senior advisor to the company to support its ongoing leadership transition before joining Palantir Technologies as global head of financial services, effective January 15, 2027.
The board has elected John Rice (pictured, right), AIG's lead independent director since January 2023, to become chair of the board, effective the same date.
Palantir said Zaffino will drive growth and transformational impact across its financial services business, spanning insurance companies, banks, asset managers, private equity firms and other financial institutions. Alex Karp, Palantir's co-founder and chief executive, said in the company's announcement that Zaffino has spent his career challenging inertia and rejecting incrementalism within large enterprises, and that Palantir is fortunate to have him joining.
This departure completes a multi-stage succession process AIG first announced in January 2026, when Zaffino said he intended to transition to executive chair and retire as chief executive after leading the company's turnaround as a global property and casualty insurer.
Eric Andersen, who served as president of Aon from 2020 to 2025, joined AIG as president and CEO-elect in February 2026 before formally becoming chief executive and joining the board on June 1. Zaffino moved into the executive chair role at that same point, having served as AIG's chairman and CEO since March 2021, when he succeeded Brian Duperreault.
Zaffino's tenure is widely credited with a substantial turnaround at AIG. Since he took over, the company delivered five consecutive years of underwriting profitability from 2021 to 2025, reversing years of losses, while AIG shares climbed more than 85% during his time as chief executive, a recovery that continued to extend the distance from the company's $182 billion taxpayer bailout during the 2008 financial crisis. During his tenure, Zaffino also divested non-core assets, integrated generative AI into operations and invested in modernisation across the company.
Rice has served on AIG's board since March 2022 and has been lead independent director since January 2023. Before joining AIG's board, he was non-executive chairman of GE Gas Power from 2018 to 2020, and spent seven years as president and chief executive of the GE Global Growth Organization, having held senior leadership positions with General Electric across global markets including Hong Kong, Singapore and Canada before retiring from GE as vice chairman in 2018.
Rice said Zaffino's leadership strengthened AIG's competitive position and created significant long-term value for shareholders, and that the board is grateful AIG will continue to benefit from his guidance and advice as senior advisor. He said he is honored to continue in a board leadership role, now as chair, working closely with fellow directors, chief executive Eric Andersen and AIG's leadership team as the company advances its strategic priorities and focuses on sustainable, profitable growth.
Zaffino said that following his transition to executive chair earlier this year, he looks forward to serving as senior advisor and working with the board and Andersen through this stage of the leadership transition, and that with AIG entering its next chapter, now is the right time for the next phase of leadership. He said he is incredibly proud of what the company has accomplished and thanked his AIG colleagues for their hard work.
Andersen's background is worth noting for brokers who place commercial and specialty lines business with AIG. He spent nearly three decades at Aon, including as CEO of Aon Benfield, CEO of Aon Risk Solutions Americas, and president of the firm from 2020 to 2025 - a career built almost entirely on the distribution and broking side of the market rather than on the carrier side.
That background does not automatically translate into a shift in AIG's underwriting appetite or its terms for distributors, and Andersen has been in the CEO role since June 1 without any announced changes to AIG's commercial or specialty lines strategy. However, a CEO who spent decades negotiating on behalf of brokers and their clients, and who understands from direct experience how carriers are assessed and selected by distribution partners, is a different leadership profile from a career underwriter or corporate finance executive. Brokers with significant AIG panels, or those seeking to expand their AIG relationship, have reasonable grounds to watch how Andersen's tenure develops in terms of distributor engagement and appetite communication over the next 12 to 18 months.
Zaffino's destination is also worth reading against a broader backdrop. Palantir has been building its presence in financial services and insurance for several years, with its data analytics and AI platforms increasingly used by carriers for underwriting, claims and risk modelling. Recruiting a figure of Zaffino's seniority and industry profile to lead that financial services push signals Palantir is treating insurance as a significant and growing revenue opportunity rather than a peripheral vertical. For insurers and MGAs currently evaluating or already using Palantir's platforms, Zaffino's arrival gives the firm a commercially credible insurance sector voice that its technology-led sales approach has arguably lacked.
