In many economies, it will take time for real output to return to pre-crisis levels. For example, although the Bank expects that the Canadian economy will attain its pre-crisis peak by the third quarter of this year, it will be yet another year and a half before the European and Japanese economies do the same.
Quite the contrary: as long as rates stayed low or negative, it had become difficult to pursue the traditional life business model, as there was in fact little space for offering the genuine insurance element in life insurance products – the transfer of financial and demographic risk from the insured to the insurer.