Lancashire Holdings to acquire Cathedral Capital

7th Aug 2013 09:25

Lancashire Holdings has entered into conditional agreements to acquire Cathedral Capital, a privately owned Lloyd's insurer.The insurance company will buy Cathedral from Alchemy Partners and Cathedral management for £266m.The transaction will funded through a combination of internally available cash resources and net proceeds of the placing of up to 16.8m new common shares in Lancashire, representing approximately 9.99% of the company's existing issued share capital.Lancashire said Cathedral's existing businesses are a strong complementary fit to its own."The transaction represents a rare opportunity to acquire a high-quality Lloyd's business with a short-tail focus, strong business model fit and robust underwriting performance," the firm said."The enlarged group will have access to an enhanced insurance and reinsurance platform and will benefit from direct participation in Lloyd's, the world's leading specialist insurance market."Shares in Lancashire fell 2.86% to 782.50p at 09:44 on Wednesday.RD