Why Life Insurers' Bet on Hard-to-Sell Investments Is Risky

U.S. life insurers have poured money into private investments locked away for over a decade with little resale market. Today these make up 14% of their portfolios, up from 10% in 2014. The danger: when policyholders demand their money, insurers may be forced to sell these assets cheap. This pattern helped trigger insolvencies in the late 1980s.