Business

Angbang Insurance Group buys USA insurer Fidelity for $1.6bn

Fidelity & Guaranty Life, headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa, is an insurance holding company, helps middle-income Americans prepare for retirement.

Ltd. (“Anbang” or “the Company”), a leading global comprehensive insurance group based in Beijing, China, and Fidelity & Guaranty Life (NYSE: FGL) (“FGL”), a leading provider of annuities and life insurance in the US, jointly announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement on November 8, 2015 pursuant to which Anbang will acquire FGL for $26.80 per share.

Anbang will buy Fidelity for $26.80 per share, according to a statement.

Founded in 2004, Beijing-based Anbang has expanded aggressively overseas and acquired the iconic Waldorf Astoria hotel in NY for US$1.95 billion a year ago. The FG&L purchase will give the firm a foothold in the world’s largest insurance market.

Staff members of Anbang Insurance Group Co. FGL’s solid life and annuity platforms will enhance the growth of business on the part of Anbang.

Image: Fidelity & Guaranty Life offers life insurance and annuity products in the US.

With around 30 million customers, Anbang provides banking, life insurance, property and casualty insurance, health insurance, pensions, securities, financial leasing and asset management services in Belgium, Netherlands and South Korea, in addition to China.

HRG, which was previously known as Harbinger Group Inc. and led by hedge-fund manager Philip Falcone, has been reshaping itself after Richard Handler’s Leucadia National Corp. increased its stake and oversight of the company. The 52-week high of the share price is $27.87 and the 52-week low is $20.5. The company has a market cap of $1.52 billion.

The transaction will make Anbang… “We believe that this transaction fully reflects the value that has been created at FGL and we strongly support it”.

Both companies have yet to release any further information about the deal aside from a closing date expectancy of the second quarter of 2016.

Asian insurers have been looking to buy insurers in the U.S.to diversify operations and add portfolios that they can reinvest.

Chinese companies are making a bigger play in U.S. insurance.

Des Moines insurer Fidelity & Guaranty Life sold

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