Figures

42

The percentage drop in securities class actions, which have fallen well below historical averages. According to the report, the 59 filings recorded in the first half of 2007 was down from the average semi-annual filing rate of 101 reported for from July 1996 through June 2005. The report was issued by the Stanford Law School Securities Class Action Clearinghouse in cooperation with Cornerstone Research.

For the two-year period beginning the second half of 2005, the average semi-annual filing rate was 61 filings, 40 percent below the average observed over the preceding nine-year period.

“We’ve now had two years worth of extremely low filing activity,” explained Stanford Law School Professor Joseph Grundfest, director of the clearinghouse and former Commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“This is starting to look like a permanent shift, not a transitory phenomenon.”

40

The percentage of U.S. adults who say they would purchase automobile insurance directly via phone, Internet or mail without first consulting an agent, an increase from 29 percent in 2003, according to a Vertis study. In particular, adults ages 35-49 are 15 percent more likely than their counterparts were in 2003 to make a direct auto insurance purchase without seeing an agent, up from 30 percent in 2003 to 45 percent in 2007. However, the study also noted that an insurance company possessing a knowledgeable agent or representative continues to be the most important insurance service for 27 percent of all adults in 2007, up just 2 percent from 2003.