Legal & General uses Ireland as springboard

British insurer Legal & General is using Ireland as its springboard into the potentially lucrative international insurance de-risking market, by signing an exclusive agreement to reinsure €136m worth of New Ireland Assurance’s existing and future annuity business.

The deal will cover annuities purchased by both individual customers and those purchased, in bulk, by Irish-based pension schemes and will take in New Ireland’s existing annuity business and “a proportion of its future business”.

The transaction also marks L&G’s first annuity reinsurance deal outside of its core market of Britain. The company — which already has a small market share of the wider Irish financial services market, via its range of investment management services and general savings products — is a market leader in annuity reinsurance in Britain and is looking to expand this part of its business internationally, viewing Ireland as a strategic market in which to begin.