Chesnara has agreed to buy MetLife UK Limited, the closed-book UK life insurer owned by MetLife, in its fourth acquisition in two years.
MetLife UK closed to new business in 2017. It manages unit-linked investment policies with optional guarantees, and variable annuities, for around 18,000 customers, with £1.7 billion of assets under administration at the end of 2025.
The deal covers only the closed book. MetLife’s UK protection business is not included, and MetLife will continue to serve those customers.
Chesnara expects the book to generate around £90 million of lifetime cash flows, about half of it within five years of completion. It expects the deal to add about £45 million to both its own funds and contractual service margin, the measure of future profit under the IFRS 17 accounting standard. The impact on its Solvency II ratio is expected to be broadly neutral.
Chesnara said the consideration, subject to customary adjustments, is not expected to be material.
The guarantee risk on MetLife UK’s variable annuities is reinsured with a European reinsurer rated AA by S&P and Fitch, and that arrangement will stay in place. Administration is already outsourced to SS&C Technologies, Chesnara’s existing UK outsourcing partner, which should make the transfer simpler.
“The transaction is a further demonstration that Chesnara is a consolidation partner of choice for blue-chip counterparties,” said Steve Murray (pictured), group chief executive of Chesnara.
Murray said Chesnara continued to see a healthy pipeline of acquisition opportunities. The deal is expected to complete in the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory approval.
The MetLife deal follows three others in two years. In December 2024, Chesnara bought a portfolio of onshore bonds from Canada Life UK. In January 2026, it completed its £260 million purchase of HSBC Life UK, its largest acquisition to date, now renamed Chesnara Life UK. In February, it agreed to buy Scottish Widows Europe, a Luxembourg-based closed life business, adding around €1.7 billion of assets.
The deals have significantly increased Chesnara’s scale. Its assets under administration rose 38% to £21 billion in the first half of 2026, and it now administers around 1.3 million policies across the UK, the Netherlands and Sweden. Its Solvency II ratio fell to 185% at the end of June, from 257% at the end of 2025, after the HSBC Life deal used up capital.
Life and pensions advisers with clients in MetLife UK variable annuities can reassure them that the guarantee reinsurance and SS&C administration are not changing. For protection advisers, MetLife remains an active UK provider - this transaction does not touch that business. More broadly, the deal continues a pattern of major insurers offloading legacy books while retaining their open distribution: advisers should expect to see more of these transactions as consolidators like Chesnara build scale.
