Insurer AIG 4th-quarter profit falls short of expectations; company plans $2.5B stock buyback

American International Group Inc. on Thursday posted fourth-quarter results that fell short of Wall Street's expectations.

The New York-based insurer said its net income totaled $655 million, or 46 cents per share, in the three-month period that ended Dec. 31. That was down from $1.98 billion, or $1.34 a share a year earlier.

Excluding an $824 million loss on the extinguishment of debt and other one-time items, AIG said it earned 97 cents per share in the most-recent quarter. Analysts had expected a profit of $1.07 per share on that basis, according to estimates compiled by Zacks Investment Research.

AIG shares fell 95 cents, or 1.8 percent, to $51.50 in aftermarket trading following the release of the earnings report.

The insurer also said it approved the repurchase of up to $2.5 billion in company stock. It bought $4.9 billion of its own shares in 2014.

Through the close of regular-session trading Thursday, AIG's stock has fallen 6.4 percent in 2015, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index has climbed slightly more than 1 percent. Despite that slump, the stock is up 7 percent over the last 12 months.

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Elements of this story were generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on AIG at http://www.zacks.com/ap/AIG

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Keywords: American International Group, Earnings Report