Quilter preparing capital return as life assurance sale completes

Quilter confirmed on Thursday that the sale of Quilter Life Assurance to ReAssure Group completed on 31 December.

The FTSE 250 company initially announced the proposed disposal on 5 August.

It said total cash consideration ended up being £445m, representing the agreed cash consideration of £425m along with accrued interest payable under the sale agreement up to the completion date of £20m.

The sale was structured under a lock-box mechanism with effective economic interest passing to ReAssure from 1 January 2019.

Interest income on the agreed sale proceeds was due to the group from that date until completion.

Thus, the contribution from Quilter Life Assurance earnings to the group's 2019 dividend of around £20m represented a partial advance distribution of sale proceeds.

“After allowing for costs and the capital impact of the transaction together with other expenses associated with the sale, the board of Quilter considers the net surplus proceeds from the sale to be £375m and regards this sum to be excess capital which is available for return to shareholders, in full,” the board said in its statement.

“The Quilter board regards the proposed distribution to represent the full net surplus proceeds from the transaction after accounting for the contribution from Quilter Life Assurance earnings to the group's 2019 dividend.”

Quilter said it would update the market on the method and timing of the capital return as soon as practical and, in any event, no later than at the time of the announcement of its full year results announcement in March 2020.

At 0957 GMT, shares in Quilter were up 1.02% at 162.7p.