JPMorgan, KKR and others join Cowdery’s latest insurance fund

Bermuda-based consolidation vehicle is the third incarnation of Sir Clive Cowdery’s acquisitive Resolution

Resolution Life, an insurance consolidation vehicle founded by Sir Clive Cowdery, has completed a $3bn fundraising and added several of the investors who contributed, including JPMorgan and KKR, to its board.

Bermuda-based Resolution Life, founded in 2017, is Cowdery’s latest vehicle for buying and merging insurers.

A previous UK company, also called Resolution, acquired a series of businesses in the 2000s before merging with Britannic Group and then being sold to Hugh Osmond’s Pearl Group, later becoming Phoenix Group.

Cowdery relaunched the Resolution business a second time, buying Friends Life in 2009 and adding other businesses from Axa Sun Life and Bupa. This was then sold to Aviva in 2014.

This latest, third incarnation has acquired $5.7bn of life insurance policies from US insurer Symetra, and in October 2018, agreed to buy various insurance businesses from AMP in Australia and New Zealand for A$3bn.

In a statement on November 18, Resolution Life said it has raised $3bn from investors to finance further deals.

Representatives from JPMorgan, KKR, the Nippon Life Insurance Company, Singaporean sovereign wealth fund Temasek, and USS, the UK’s largest pension fund, will join its board — alongside an unnamed Middle Eastern sovereign fund.

Credit Suisse Asset Management acted as a placement agent on the fundraising.

Cowdery, who is executive chair of the company, said: “Resolution Life will continue to grow and release trapped capital and stranded costs for life insurers across a number of markets. I am delighted to welcome our cornerstone investors onto our board.”

Source: Financial News

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