AIG agreed Monday to sell its American Life Insurance Co. unit to MetLife Inc. for $15.5 billion in cash and stock, in beleaguered AIG’s second sale of an international unit in a week.

AIG said it will sell the unit, known as Alico, for $6.8 billion in cash and the remainder in MetLife equity. The deal leaves AIG as the second-largest shareholder of MetLife, with a stake of more than 20% in the company.

Selling Alico, one of its largest international life insurance businesses, will allow government-controlled AIG to take yet another step in repaying the nearly $132 billion it borrowed from the federal government beginning in 2008 to avoid collapse.

Expected to close by the end of the year, the companies said the acquisition will also help MetLife, the largest seller of life insurance in the United States, grow internationally and especially target Japan.

The deal came a week after AIG announced an agreement to sell its Asian life insurance business, American Insurance Assurance Ltd (AIA), to Britain’s Prudential PLC in a deal valued at $35.5 billion, including $25 billion in cash.

AIG said it expects to generate about $50.7 billion from these two transactions, including approximately $31.5 billion in cash to repay the New York Federal Reserve Bank and another $19.2 billion in securities that it will sell over time to repay the government.

“This sale is an important step toward repaying the government,” Harvey Golub, chairman of AIG, said in a statement. “Both sales give AIG greater flexibility to move forward with our restructuring and rebuilding efforts, and focus on enhancing the value of our key insurance businesses.”

At the end of February, AIG announced a loss of $8.9 billion in the fourth quarter of 2009, which it said was largely due to the costs associated with selling off large stakes in its insurance businesses to reduce the debt it owes to taxpayers.

In December, AIG sold stakes in AIA and Alico to the U.S. government. In exchange for those transactions, the Fed reduced the amount AIG has to repay taxpayers by $25 billion. AIG said it took a $5.2 billion charge for that agreement last quarter.

The deal for Alico has been approved by the boards of both AIG and MetLife, and is subject to regulatory approvals in the United States and overseas. To top of page

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General Motors on Wednesday announced that its vice chairman will retire on May 1.

Bob Lutz will step down in two months, ending a 47-year career in the auto industry that included tours of duty at BMW, Chrysler and Ford. He began his career at GM, working there from 1963 to 1971, then rejoined the company in 2001.

For most of the past nine years, the 78-year old was GM’s head of product development, with a brief detour into helming the Detroit giant’s marketing. As the company’s product visionary, Lutz helped create successful new vehicles such as the Chevrolet Malibu, Buick Enclave, Cadillac CTS and the Chevrolet Equinox. He also at spearheaded development of the Chevrolet Volt electric car.

“I can confidently say that the job I came here to do more than nine years ago is now complete,” Lutz said in a prepared statement. “Our product lineup is as strong as it has been in GM’s history.”

While at Chrysler, Lutz led the development of products like the PT Cruiser and the Dodge Viper performance car. He has been a longtime proponent of the idea that cars must be, first and foremost, emotionally appealing.

Lutz tried once before to retire from GM (GM, Fortune 500). Shortly before the government took control of the company last year, he made plans to depart, but reversed his stance a few months later.

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New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said Tuesday that Wall Street bonuses jumped 17% last year, to an estimated $20.3 billion, as profits in the financial services sector rebounded.

The average taxable bonus for securities industry employees in New York rose to $123,850 in 2009 from $112,000 the year before, according to estimates from the comptroller.

At Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500), Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500), and JPMorgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) overall compensation increased by 31% in 2009. Average compensation rose by 27% to more than $340,000.

The rebound in bonus payments comes amid a sharp increase in Wall Street profits, which could reach an “unprecedented” $55 billion for 2009, DiNapoli said.

That would be nearly three times greater than the previous all-time record annual profit, but follows a $42.6 billion loss in 2008.

The bulk of the increase in profits came from broker-dealer operations, which brought in a record $49.9 billion through the first three quarters of 2009.

Despite the increase in compensation and profits, bonus payments remain below record levels of just a few years ago. In 2007, for example, bonuses totaled nearly $33 billion.

“It’s still not back to historic levels,” DiNapoli told reporters at a press conference in New York. “It’s down by about 30% compared to the numbers in the bonus pool prior to the downturn and the great recession.”

DiNapoli said the financial services industry is “vital” to New York’s economy, but he acknowledged the massive bonuses are a “bitter pill” for most Americans.

“There’s a lot of resentment against the industry over its role in the global economic meltdown,” DiNapoli said in a statement. “Taxpayers bailed them out, and now they’re back making money while many New York families are still struggling to make ends meet.”

Wall Street firms received billions in government bailout funds in 2009 as the financial crisis crippled the industry and the economy sank into one of the worst recessions on record.

The report notes that most of the big financial firms have said that their top executives will receive stock options and other forms of deferred compensation for 2009 in lieu of cash bonuses. DiNapoli also pointed out that Wall Street lost over 30,000 jobs last year, though the industry added about 3,900 jobs in the final three months of 2009.

The estimates, based on tax collections reflecting cash bonuses and deferred compensation for which taxes have been prepaid, do not include bonuses paid by Wall Street firms to their employees outside of New York City. The figures do not include stock options that have not yet been realized or other forms of deferred compensation.

The report also said that the estimated bonus pool for 2010 is a third less than the amount paid two years ago, which was the previous most profitable year. DiNapoli noted that estimating the size of the bonus pool was made more difficult this year by unprecedented changes in compensation practices.

“We do have to acknowledge that there have been some changes in compensation,” the Comptroller said. “Not all of it is cash and up front.”

The rebound in bonus payments could be a boon for New York state, which is struggling to close a massive budget deficit.

On Tuesday, DiNapoli said lower tax collections, among other things, could cause New York’s budget deficit to balloon to more than $2 billion this year.

“There’s some good news from a revenue perspective for New York State’s tax revenues,” DiNapoli said. “But the other message is that Main Street has not benefited from this.”

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