pension risk transfer

German reinsurer Hannover Re has completed two block reinsurance transactions for longevity risks in the UK which between them will see the reinsurer assume around £1 billion worth of pension plan longevity risks. This brings the total amount of longevity risk assumed by the reinsurer in 2013 to around £3 billion when added to its […]

One of the largest pension risk transfer deals on record could be subject to a class action lawsuit after a judge ruled that retirees could launch a legal action. The pension risk transfer deal, involving Verizon Communications transferring $7.5 billion of the Verizon Management Pension Plan obligations to insurer Prudential, had already been subject to […]

UK insurance and investment group Legal & General has completed the largest ever UK longevity swap with the BAE Systems 2000 Pension Plan. The insurance transaction between the two covers the BAE pension plan against the risk of its 31,000 current pensioners living longer than expected, covering a total of £2.7bn of pension liabilities as […]

One of the largest mutual life insurers in the U.S. has shown its interest in the UK pension risk transfer and de-risking market by investing in one of the leading players in that sector in the last week. Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, or MassMutual for short, has made an investment in leading UK pension […]

About a week ago we wrote about the challenge to the $7.5 billion pension risk transfer transaction which would see Verizon Communications transferring $7.5 billion of the Verizon Management Pension Plan obligations to insurer Prudential. The deal was hit with a lawsuit from two Verizon retirees who filed suit seeking to block the transaction as […]

One of the largest pension risk transfer transactions on record has hit a stumbling block just prior to the deals completion. The $7.5 billion transaction would see Verizon Communications transferring $7.5 billion of the Verizon Management Pension Plan obligations to insurer Prudential. It’s a group annuity deal, where Verizon buys the annuity contract from Prudential […]

Pension plans and schemes are increasingly looking at their ability to fund their obligations to pensioners as their returns fall due to the wider economic and financial market issues and their pensioners live longer meaning they are on the hook for more payments than expected. This scenario is leading pension plans to look to ways […]

Fitch Ratings says in a press release that UK life insurers are expected to increase their pension exposure from corporates looking to offload pension fund risks including longevity. There is an opportunity for life insurers to grow their business by participating in pension risk transfer with one of the main areas of potential growth in […]

An interesting difference of opinion amongst some of the leading rating agencies has become apparent in their respective press releases regarding Prudential’s recent $26 billion pension risk transfer deal for automaker General Motors. The transaction saw GM offload a huge amount of risk by transferring $26 billion of future pension obligations to Prudential. Not strictly […]

We’ve been saying for a number of years that the longevity risk transfer market has the potential to grow to a massive size given the amount of liabilities pension plans around the world are exposed to. Longevity risk transfer takes many forms as pension plans offload longevity risks via swaps, hedges, buy-in/out, annuities and reinsurance. […]