Utmost Expands Further As Acquisition Completes

Tom Burroughes

22 June 2018

Life Company Consolidation Group, parent of Isle of Man-headquartered , this week completed its agreed purchase of Generali PanEurope from Italian financial group Generali.

The deal turns Utmost into the second-largest cross-border provider of unit-linked wealth solutions in Europe, and more acquisitions are planned, it said.

The acquisition takes Utmost’s AuM to more than €24 billion ($27.7 billion).

LCCG, founded in 2013, is a specialist life assurance group; it has so far bought eight business in Ireland and the Isle of Man. It is backed by funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management.

Generali PanEurope’s wealth protection, investment planning and employee benefits business are combined with Utmost’s existing international savings, protection and investment solutions offering. The purchased business is now called Utmost PanEurope.

In July, Utmost Wealth Solutions completed its acquisition of Axa Life Europe's investment bond business and opened a new office in Dublin. The Axa Life Europe portfolio was acquired by Harcourt Life International, which was subsequently renamed Utmost Ireland and will trade under the Utmost Wealth Solutions brand.

The transaction is another example of a trend of M&A deals in European wealth management, with firms seeking scale to preserve an edge at a time of rising regulatory costs, while others are spinning off operations seen as non-core to concentrate on areas where they can achieve profitable growth.

The M&A deal was initially announced in December last year; the purchase price wasn’t disclosed.