Thales pension fund secures $3.4 billion in liabilities with buy-in

Thales UK Pension Scheme, Crawley, England, has insured £2.7 billion ($3.4 billion) in liabilities through a buy-in with Rothesay Life.

The transaction, which insures all liabilities of the pension fund, secures the benefits of 10,512 retirees and beneficiaries, and 5,915 deferred participants, according to a Dec. 1 news release from Rothesay Life.

Rothesay Life also noted it had accepted a number of illiquid assets held in the pension fund's investment portfolio as part of the transaction premium.

"This has been an important transaction to the sponsor where we have had to work through a number of new challenges and are therefore pleased that we have been able to secure the pension benefits of over 16,000 current and past employees," said Paul Durrant, director of compensation and benefits at Thales UK, in the news release.

PricewaterhouseCoopers was the lead transaction adviser, Travers Smith provided legal advice; and Gowling WLG, Mercer and Momentum Advisors were advisers to the pension fund's trustee.

The pension fund's asset size was not provided in the news release. Thales UK spokesman Adrian Rondel could not be immediately reached for further information.