Briefs: insurer to offer home loans, unbalanced gender savings, NAB's tier 2 bond, ASIC sues fund ma 21 November 2014 4:18PM Banking Day staff Briefs, South African life insurance player Hollard Insurance, better known for its Real Insurance brand, will be wading into a mortgage sector dominated by the Big Four banks, offering an online home loan product for loans valued up to $750,000 that can be approved in under 25 minutes, the AFR reports. The insurance giant is hoping a cross-sell from mortgages will boost its life insurance sales. The latest RaboDirect Financial Health Barometer shows that women are worse off than their male counterparts when it comes to the size of their savings buffer. The survey revealed that females would only have a 92 day savings buffer if they were to lose their job tomorrow, compared to men who reported a 120 days savings buffer. Overall, the survey says that Australians have a savings buffer that would only cover them for 3.6 months if they were to lose their job tomorrow, down from 4.7 months last year. Fitch Ratings has assigned A+ to National Australia Bank's Basel III unsecured and subordinated Tier 2 compliant program. Their final maturity is 12 November 2024, although NAB may redeem the notes on 12 November 2019 if they no longer qualify as regulatory capital, or if the tax treatment of the notes changes. The redemption can only go ahead with the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority's written approval. The notes include a non-viability clause and will qualify as regulatory Tier 2 capital for the bank. The notes pay a fixed rate of two per cent up to, but not including, 12 November 2019, and the prevailing five year EUR mid-market swap rate plus 165 basis points thereafter. Early next week, ASIC will start civil penalty proceedings in the Federal Court of Australia against Peter Drake, the founder of LM Investment Management, along with four of the fund manager's former directors. ASIC is seeking financial penalties and banning orders against them for failing to act with the proper degree of care and diligence; particularly the conduct of the directors in signing off on a series of larger loans in 2011 and 2012 from the LM Managed Performance Fund to Maddison Estate, a private company owned and controlled by Drake. LMIM was the responsible entity for seven registered managed investment schemes and the trustee for MPF, an unregistered managed investment scheme with about 4,500 investors.