Aviva Plc, the U.K.'s second-biggest insurer, said Andrew Moss quit as chief executive officer after presiding over an almost 60 percent fall in the share price in the last five years and a row about pay. The stock rose.

The firm's incoming chairman, John McFarlane, will immediately become interim executive deputy chairman, the London-based insurer said today in a statement. Finance Director Pat Regan, Andy Haste, former RSA Insurance Group Plc CEO, and Trevor Matthews, CEO of the insurer's U.K. business, were named by analysts as possible successors to Moss.

"Andrew has been unpopular with many shareholders who feel he has at times seemed out of touch with the issues that they thought were facing the group," Marcus Barnard, a London-based analyst at Oriel Securities Ltd. with a buy rating on the stock, wrote in a note to investors today.

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