Rodney Adler

Rodney Adler
Rodney Adler and his father Larry Adler, 1988
Born	(1959-08-19) 19 August 1959 (age 57)
Nationality	Australian
Alma mater	University of New South Wales Macquarie University
Occupation	Businessman, former company director
Criminal charge	Disseminating information knowing it to be false (2005); Obtaining money by false or misleading statements (2005); Being intentionally dishonest and failing to discharge his duties as a director in good faith (2005)
Criminal penalty	4½ years' custody, with a non-parole period of 2½ years (14 April 2005)
Criminal status	Released (13 October 2007)
Spouse(s)	Lyndi Adler

Rodney Stephen Adler (born 19 August 1959) is an Australian whose family founded the FAI Insurances group, of which he became Chief Executive in 1989, and which was at one stage Australia's third largest general insurer. Adler became a director of HIH Insurance after the acquisition of that company, and resigned in January 2001, two months before HIH collapsed. He was jailed in 2005 for his conduct related to the collapse of HIH, where Adler obtained A$2 million from HIH by false or misleading statements and being dishonest as a director.

Adler is the son of Hungarian immigrant Larry Adler, who founded the insurance company FAI in 1960. He was educated at Cranbrook School, and later obtained degrees of Bachelor of Commerce from the University of New South Wales and Master of Economics from Macquarie University and is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and Adjunct Professor at UTS.

He is married to Lyndi and has four children: Jason, Romi, Natalie (Tali) and Charlotte.

Adler was appointed Chief Executive by the board of FAI after the death of his father in November 1988, at a time when the company was struggling with a number of loan exposures to troubled companies such as Bond Corp and Ariadne in the wake of the October 1987 stock market crash. FAI had largely stabilised by the time the company became the subject of a takeover bid from HIH in September 1998. HIH had done no due diligence on FAI, but bid nevertheless. Total acquisition cost was A$280 million in cash and HIH shares. HIH subsequently sold assets out of FAI including its life insurance company, the St Moritz Hotel in New York and shares in the telecommunications company One.Tel to raise about A$450 million.

After the FAI acquisition was completed Adler became a director of HIH in January 1999. HIH was already in trouble as a result of underprovisioning for claims over many years, and it accumulated large losses in the Lloyd's of London insurance market and in the US which eventually brought about its collapse in March 2001.

In its final months, as HIH attempted to sell assets to raise much-needed cash, it succeeded in selling the FAI business it had acquired less than two years previously into a joint venture with Germany's Allianz Group. HIH and, subsequently the HIH liquidator, raised A$320 million from the sale of the ongoing FAI business.