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Legal & General Group Plc has forayed into what is described as the attractive and fast-growing pension risk transfer (PRT) market in Canada.
An announcement by the UK-headquartered insurer said it has agreed its first Canadian PRT transaction, which is being written by Ontario-based life insurer Brookfield Annuity Company and Legal & General Reinsurance. The latter will provide quota-share reinsurance for such transfers in Canada, whose PRT market has more than doubled in size over the last five years.
According to L&G, the reinsurance unit – the group’s vehicle for writing PRT business outside of the UK and the US – is taking a meaningful quota-share of the total buy-in liabilities written by Brookfield Annuity. Their strategic alliance’s inaugural deal is worth more than CA$200 million (£114 million).
“I am delighted to announce our first PRT transaction in Canada, where the market is growing strongly,” commented L&G chief executive Nigel Wilson. “The transaction provides further evidence of our appetite and capability to grow our PRT business internationally.”
With the addition of this deal in Canada, the British enterprise has now written £2.5 billion in international PRT since 2015.
“We are excited by the opportunity to provide reinsurance into the Canadian pension risk transfer market,” said Legal & General Reinsurance CEO Thomas Olunloyo. “We look forward to working with Brookfield Annuity Company who are a rapidly growing specialist provider of pension de-risking products.”
For Brookfield Annuity chief executive Paul Forestell, the partnership offers additional capacity for a quickly expanding Canadian market.
