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A European insurance group backed by Apollo Global Management is nearing a £6bn takeover of UK retirement savings group Pension Insurance Corporation, a deal that would further push the US alternative assets giant into the UK insurance market.
Athora, a European-based insurer minority owned by Apollo, is close to acquiring full ownership of PIC from a consortium of investors, including CVC Capital and Reinet Investments, a vehicle backed by South African billionaire Johann Rupert, according to three people briefed on the matter. A deal could be announced as soon as this week.
The acquisition would push Athora, which operates in countries including Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, into the UK, the largest retirement market in Europe.
It would come as US private capital giants such as Apollo, Brookfield Asset Management, KKR and Carlyle have either begun operating in the UK retirement market or studied acquisitions in recent years.
PIC declined to comment. Apollo and CVC did not immediately respond. Sky News first reported that PIC was nearing a sale.
PIC, which manages about £50bn in assets and has nearly 400,000 policyholders in the UK, would roughly double Athora’s size, according to company filings. It would also put PIC under the full ownership of Athora, a fast-growing, pan-European insurer that is backed by Apollo.
Apollo acts as a what is called a “subadviser” managing some of Athora’s assets, meaning it may have a hand in managing the assets of PIC’s customers.
The sale of PIC would be a large windfall for its owners, who also include Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and US credit investor HPS Investment Management. HPS earlier this week completed its $12bn sale to BlackRock.
PIC’s value has roughly tripled since CVC first invested in 2017. Reinet, a Luxembourg-based investment vehicle, first invested in PIC in 2012, buying a 43 per cent stake for £400mn and increasing its investment over time.
PIC has expanded quickly under Reinet and CVC’s ownership by taking over corporate pension fund liabilities, and the assets that back them. In 2023, it acquired £6.5bn of liabilities from general insurer RSA, then the biggest UK deal of its kind.
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Athora had studied an acquisition of PIC for years, and the insurer had previously drawn interest from other US private capital giants, including Carlyle and KKR, the Financial Times previously reported.
In recent years, Apollo has been an active investor in the UK, buying companies including Restaurant Group, the owner of the Wagamama food chain. Last month it committed to lend £4.5bn to fund the development of a nuclear power station in Somerset, England.
In 2022, a different Apollo insurance subsidiary, Athene, bought more than $1bn of assets from UK pension funds during a crisis triggered by the UK’s disastrous “mini” Budget.