In the UK, unbundled policies are generally referred to as being unit-linked
because the investment element of the policy is housed in funds that are
divided into units of equal value. We will refer to unit-linked policies throughout
the rest of this paper.
A unit-linked policy is one whose underlying investments are identifiable and
determine its cash values.
It is important to recognize that the assets of the funds may not be shares –
they may be fixed-interest securities, money market instruments, property,
derivative instruments, as well as shares. Indeed, the assets of a particular fund
may consist of a mixture of these asset types. The client normally has a choice
of funds having different characteristics to which premiums can be allocated.