The benefit of falling interest rates for bond insurers is twofold.

The guaranteed investment contract is the first the bond insurer has provided for an insurance company.

Four large municipal bond insurers disclosed yesterday that they had a combined exposure of $14 billion.

He added that the investment contracts they wanted to insure were beyond the expertise of bond insurers.

Municipal bond insurers say their exposure in the region is $14 billion.

"We have 31 percent of the market," he said, "and we're competing for business with three other major bond insurers."

In the late 1990s and early 2000s a new group of bond insurers emerged.

The financial crisis that began in late 2007 negatively impacted the bond insurers and even threatened the continued existence of some industry members.

But if history is any guide, the county's imbroglio will prove to be good for the bond insurers' business.

"It is not possible to analyze a bond insurer without looking at the ownership pedigree," he said.