Paul Achleitner, head of finance, Allianz

Bloomberg reports that Allianz SE, Europe’s biggest insurer and the manager of a portfolio of about $600 billion, expects stocks to fall because economic recovery is lagging behind the seven-month jump in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index.

“The market rally right now is — my personal view is — way ahead of real-life developments,” Paul Achleitner, head of finance at Munich-based Allianz, said yesterday in an interview at Bloomberg headquarters in New York. “The expectation level is so high, you’re going to have the risk that there’s going to be a discrepancy in expectation” and economic data, Achleitner said.

The stock market rally has led many commentators to declare the recession over, claiming that a “V-shaped” recovery is underway. Sober comments from critical observers like Achleitner are less popular on the business channels.