Good morning. Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us at such short notice to discuss the sale of our U.S. protection business to Meiji Yasuda and the creation of our strategic partnership, so the usual forward-looking statements apply. This morning, I will run through the key aspects of this transaction and the partnership, and then Jeff will run you through how the transaction impacts our financials before we move into Q&A, so starting then with the strategic aspects of today's announcement. Last year, I announced a strategy to create a growing, simpler, and better connected L&G that will be more capital-light over time, and I described three key aspects of that strategy. If you remember, back in June, we talked about three things. We talked about sharper focus, sustainable growth, and enhanced returns.
What we've announced this morning is fully aligned with that strategy and builds on the momentum that we've had executing the strategy over the last year. So first, in terms of sharper focus, the sale of our U.S. protection business unlocks significant value at close to 30 times earnings. This then allows us to reinvest in our core strategic businesses that are more synergistic. Second, the creation of a long-term strategic partnership with Meiji Yasuda will deliver sustainable growth in our U.S. PRT and asset management businesses. And finally, with regards to enhanced returns, we anticipate a buyback of GBP 1 billion from the proceeds of this sale, and this is incremental to our previous announcements, meaning that we expect to return circa 40% of our market cap over the next three years through a combination of dividends and share buybacks.
Now, taking each one of the three elements in turns and starting with sharper focus. Sharper focus is really all about disciplined capital allocation. Last year, we did a forensic review of all of our businesses on their strategic fit and financial performance. This led to the creation of our corporate investments unit, which reports to Jeff, and subsequently to the disposal of Cala, which you can see over there on the slide. The U.S. protection business is high-performing, so you can see it over there in the charts, kind of towards the top of the chart, and it has been growing rapidly in recent years. Strategically, though, it offers limited synergies with the rest of our businesses, and so you can see here on the chart that it's sitting to the left of the chart on the strategic fit axis.
This transaction allows us to unlock substantial value for the group at attractive multiples, as I mentioned, and then to reallocate that capital to areas of strategic growth. So turning to that, to the second part of our strategy, which is sustainable growth. The strategic partnership with Meiji Yasuda will help us scale U.S. PRT, fueling our growth strategy in what is a very attractive market. We've been working with Meiji Yasuda for 10 years. They are one of the oldest and largest Japanese life insurers, and they were the first to expand into the U.S. back in 1976, and post the completion of this transaction, they will have $80 billion of U.S. insurance assets. The partnership will draw on our global PRT experience and strong momentum that we have in our U.S. PRT business.
We had record volumes last year in 2024 and over $12 billion written since we started that business back in 2015, as you can see on this chart. But the partnership goes well beyond just PRT. First, three elements of this. First, L&G will continue to provide asset management services to the PRT and protection businesses, therefore generating incremental fee-based revenues in our asset management business. Second, Meiji Yasuda will co-invest in our global private markets business, which is central to our growth strategy that we announced back in June. And finally, Meiji Yasuda intends to acquire a 5% shareholding in L&G, which reflects their confidence in our strategy and long-term vision for the business. And finally, enhanced returns. So this is the third aspect of the strategy.
We stated at our capital markets event that we intended to return more to shareholders, and this is exactly what we are doing. Over the next three years, we intend to return $3.6 billion in dividends. You can see here on the chart, the normal dividends. On top of that, we have the share buybacks that we set out at the capital markets day event back in June. And then since then, we have taken further actions to improve our capital efficiency. For instance, following the Cala disposal, we released GBP 100 million of capital. And then in December, we told you that we intend to increase our share buyback given the lower strain on our U.K. PRT business.
And today, and this is what's new on this chart, we are announcing that we expect to return a further GBP 1 billion, which is more than 50% of the total proceeds from this transaction. Altogether, over the next three years, we expect to return over GBP 5 billion to shareholders, which is around 40% of our market cap. With that, I will now pass over to Jeff to run you through the financials. Jeff.
Thank you, António, and good morning, everyone. The financial elements of this transaction can be split into three key areas. Firstly, the compelling commercials. This transaction, together with the intended GBP 1 billion buyback, is accretive to our metrics. Secondly, we have used our disciplined capital allocation framework to determine how we use the proceeds for reinvestment or capital return. And lastly, the increased confidence in meeting our group financial targets. As mentioned, the agreed commercial terms of the transaction are attractive and generate both immediate and future value for shareholders. The headline price compares favorably with the anticipated 2024 earnings of the business, and we expect to generate more than GBP 1 billion of IFRS profits on completion. This, combined with the buyback, is accretive to our EPS metrics, more than offsetting the dilution of earnings. Moving on to the capital implications.
This transaction will accelerate GBP 1.2 billion of surplus, which equates to around five times the net surplus generation of the business sold. This acceleration of the surplus is a significant contribution to our three-year cumulative capital generation target of GBP 5-GBP 6 billion. We will disclose the exact figure at completion and include it as we start to monitor progress against that target. Finally, the sale will have a positive impact on the group's Solvency II ratio, increasing it by approximately 7% after the intended buyback. As António mentioned, in line with our disciplined capital allocation framework, we intend to return over 50% of the GBP 1.8 billion proceeds to shareholders with a GBP 1 billion buyback. This is incremental to the group's existing distribution policy. Approximately GBP 400 million of the proceeds will be used to fund the U.S.
PRT reinsurance arrangement and support the growth of the business through our partnership with Meiji Yasuda. We intend to deploy the remainder of the proceeds into our asset management business and other growth areas. In line with the capital discipline we have shown over the last year, future investments will be required to meet our 14% return hurdle. As we showed in December, if these opportunities are not available or we are more capital efficient, we will consider returning more to shareholders. Through this transaction, we now have even more confidence in meeting the group financial targets. The transaction is accretive to our core operating EPS post the buyback, and we are on track against our ROE target, and as I mentioned earlier, we have accelerated the surplus emergence of the U.S. protection business, and so have increased our confidence in achieving our capital generation targets. Now back to António .
Thank you, Jeff. So look, in summary, everything we have announced today aligns to our strategy. You can see it here on the slide. Look, this is a highly accretive transaction, which at attractive multiples delivers substantial value for our shareholders and also provides this sharper focus on our growth businesses. Our strategic partnership with Meiji Yasuda will deliver sustainable growth for both our U.S. PRT businesses, but also our asset management business globally, including this co-investment commitment to our private markets business. And finally, we are delivering for shareholders. With an additional GBP 1 billion share buyback, we expect to return around 40% of our market cap over the next three years through a combination of dividends and buybacks. We look forward to working with Meiji Yasuda and to have them as a key shareholder and as a strategic partner.
I believe this is a vote of confidence in our partnership and our strategy. I will now open up for the lines for questions. The way to do this, if you look at it on the screens, please use the sort of raised hand function on your screen, and then I'll come to you. So when I say your name, you'll know to unmute and ask a question. So let's start. So the first question is from Farooq. Hi, Farooq. Good morning.
Good morning. I hope you can hear me now.
I can, actually. Yes.
Thank you very much. So just wanted to ask about the co-investment opportunity in private markets. Can you tell us how much of your asset management business is currently in Japan and what kind of participation Meiji already has with you, and what is the kind of size of the commitment or some sort of qualitative guide to the commitment that they will be giving to your private markets business? That's question one. And then question two is, on the proceeds you've given us, thank you so much, the details on the buyback and on keeping GBP 400 million for the PRT business in the U.S., can you give a little bit more sort of flavor of what the rest will be used in? So you talk about asset management and other growth opportunities.
If you could just give us an idea of what things you want to achieve with the remaining proceeds? Those are my questions. Thank you.
Perfect. Thank you. Thank you, Farooq, and good morning. As I said, thank you for everybody for joining us at 9:00 A.M. when we did an hour and a half at 7:00 A.M. Thank you for digesting all of this. On your first question, I think it's probably worth just stepping back, as you know, you were here in the room where we're sitting now when I announced the strategy back in June of last year. We talked about asset management as the growth engine for us going forward on top of what is a very strong institutional retirement business and a retail business. When I talked about asset management, a big part of that was moving into areas where we believe our clients want solutions from L&G and that those revenue margins are higher. A big part of that is our commitment to private markets.
So if you step back in terms of our overall strategy, we're already very strong in several areas of private markets, real estate, private credits, infrastructure. And so this is aligned to that. And what Meiji Yasuda are saying as part of this strategic agreement, they are going to co-invest with us in that global private markets business. So the first thing to say, Farooq, is that this is now a global partnership where they will be investing in different aspects. And of course, that is an ongoing commitment over the next few years. But you know that our private markets business invests in everything from affordable housing, the fund that we launched here in the U.S., Build to Rent here in the U.K., Build to Rent, what we're doing with Oxford University.
There's a series of private markets opportunities that are very key to our strategy and that we've been showing great momentum, so that's the first thing to say. Second, you mentioned Japan, so Japan has been a key market for us for a very long time. Meiji Yasuda are one of our key partners. Of course, they will be even a bigger partner now, but also it's public that we work with GPIF, the largest pension fund in the world, so the Japanese pension fund. And we have a series of other clients in Japan, so this partnership with Meiji Yasuda will allow us to make Japan even a bigger part of our business.
Of our global AUM, 40% is outside the U.K., and then a portion of that, roughly GBP 100 billion or so, is in Asia, so Asia is a very important market for us, a very important region.
Within that, Japan is critical. As you know, we have three offices in Asia: Tokyo, Hong Kong, and the most recent one, Singapore. So that's in terms of their ongoing commitment to co-invest with us in private markets. We're very excited about that part of the agreement. In terms of the proceeds, so Jeff talked about that GBP 400 million. You may want to add to that. In terms of the remainder, so first thing to say, we are returning in a share buyback more than 50% of the proceeds. And for me, that's important. We said we're going to return more to shareholders, and that's exactly what we're doing. We then have the growth of PRT, and we have the GBP 400 million that Jeff will elaborate. On the rest, if you think of the remainder, they're absolutely, Farooq, aligned to our strategic priorities.
So I've talked about growing asset management. I've talked about growing asset management private markets. What did we do at the end of last year? We did the acquisition of Taurus in the U.S. They're based in Boston. They're a real estate equity player in the U.S. That's exactly right at the center of our strategy. So private markets, real estate, U.S. growth. So you can expect that type of organic growth, and as I've signaled throughout last year, built on acquisitions that are really aligned with that. Do you want to talk about the GBP 400 million?
Yeah. I mean, I think you guys understand the dynamics of the U.S. PRT business. We're taking some of the in force. We're replacing some of the capital that we had there. That's relatively small. And some of the GBP 400, it's not necessarily incremental. We had it in our plan to write U.S. PRT, and if anything, we'd hope to write bigger volumes than we had in our original plans before this, making us at least back in the same net position with 80% of the business. And so that's sort of over our five-year sort of planning horizon that we'd expect to be deploying that capital against the U.S. PRT, mostly through probably Bermuda, places like that, as we work with them to make the business as capital efficient as possible.
Jeff made a very important point, Farooq, which is every single pound, every single dollar that we're spending has this discipline of capital allocation at 14%, so return on that capital. And therefore, as we did back in December when we did the institutional retirement capital markets event, any capital that we're not spending where we don't see the right opportunities meeting that hurdle, we will return that to shareholders. So this is what we believe we will do in terms of growth. But my commitment to you is that every single pound, every single dollar will have that return on capital of 14%. And for instance, when we have lower strain, as we said last year in U.K. PRT, we're returning a part of that to shareholders. Thank you, Farooq. Second question comes from Rhea from Deutsche Bank. Hi, Rhea. Good morning.
Hi. Hi, morning, António, Jeff. Congratulations on the deal. Just two questions from me as well. The first one, in terms of the, this is just a clarification point, perhaps, in terms of Meiji Yasuda's intention to acquire 5% of your shares, is there any timing on this? Will this be post-completion of the deal? And then the second question, just going back to Farooq's point around where the money, the last GBP 400 million, is being reinvested. You've spoken about asset management. Is this incremental to the GBP 50 million-GBP 100 million of asset management investment you had already penciled in? And other than private markets, where will this be going towards?
Thank you. Thank you, Rhea. Jeff should comment also on the 5%. But if I go back to exactly what I said, I believe this is a great statement of confidence and intent in terms of both our partnership, but also their confidence in our strategy and long-term prospects. This is absolutely up to Meiji Yasuda to decide when to buy the shares. But they have, as we've both signaled this morning, their intention to acquire 5% of our shares. In terms of the, do you want to talk a bit about timing?
There isn't really anything to add to that. I mean, we clearly can't know when they want to be buying the shares. That wouldn't be appropriate at all. For all we know, they could have bought them all this morning, or they might be waiting until after closing. That is entirely up to them. There is an intention from them to build up this 5% over time, which obviously we welcome, but we welcome the signaling that it gives to the partnership.
Yeah. And I think, Rhea, on your second question, I think I said something, if you remember, back in June, I'm trying to be super consistent here with our strategy, which is obviously we have a very strong position from a solvency perspective today. And overall, this gives us strategic flexibility to pursue growth opportunities. And actually, that's what we're saying from a GBP 400 million perspective. Actually, it can be in parts of asset management or other parts of the business. What I absolutely guarantee you is, number one, fully aligned with the strategy that we've outlined and with that discipline on the 14% return on capital. And to reinforce this, if we don't spend that money, we will return that to shareholders. Thank you, Rhea.
Thank you.
Next question from Andrew Baker from Goldman Sachs. Hi, Andrew.
Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. First one, so I appreciate you accelerating the surplus generation of the U.S. business, but how do you think about the dividend cover on an ongoing basis, sort of if you look through the GBP 200 million-GBP 250 million of net surplus generation when the sort of transaction completes? Second, I think the U.S. balance sheet has historically, or the size of the U.S. balance sheet has historically been a constraint for your U.S. PRT growth. Does this transaction increase your capacity to write more in terms of larger deals or just volumes in general? And is there any impact on strain as well? And then third, the earnings multiple is clearly very strong. Can you just help me think about the capital generation multiple? Because it looks like that's below the group.
But are there any nuances around that GBP 200, GBP 250 surplus, whether it's Solvency II equivalents, U.S. reserving, just anything there to be aware of? Thank you.
So thank you. Thank you, Andrew. So Jeff, I think you should cover all of them, NSG. But I think just to point on your second one in terms of the strategic aspects of U.S. PRT. So I showed it in one of the slides. I didn't really quite cover it, but you probably saw it, Andrew, which is I've talked about this golden era, global golden era of PRT. I covered that extensively in our capital markets event back in December when we did a deep dive in institutional retirement. We talked about $1 trillion over the next 10 years. And I talked specifically about $500 billion in the U.S. over the next 10 years. And this, yes, Andrew, gives us the sort of firepower together with Meiji Yasuda to pursue those deals. We will absolutely have exactly the same capital discipline, exactly the same return discipline.
So the opportunity ahead of us is the same. But by partnering together, tomorrow morning, nothing changes, right? So we are going out to the market. They're the same teams. They're co-located. They're part of Meiji Yasuda and L&G. We have 80% of the business. They have 20%. But yes, we have a stronger combined balance sheet that allows us to go after those opportunities. Jeff, maybe you want to comment on that also in terms of strain, which was one of Andrew's questions, and NSG, and then the multiple of the five times.
Yeah, sure. And I think your first point and the last point are actually the same thing, the surplus generation, dividend cover, net surplus generation. So yeah, I mean, as António said many times, on any basis, getting GBP 1.8 billion of cash is a positive for this business. How do we think about specifically dividend cover, net surplus generation? So to start with, we have, through everything we've done, probably the most capital efficient U.S. term writing possible in the market. And actually, some of the work that we've been doing over many, many months with Meiji Yasuda is to allow them to replicate that structure and continue to deliver growth in that business in a very capital efficient way, working with us on the PRT side of things. So that is very important because that then is what you're seeing in the metrics.
But really, what does that mean and what's happening is the surplus generation number was very large because through writing such increasing volumes of U.S. term, we were effectively being able to take credit for the future surpluses of that new business. So it was very dependent on writing continuing volumes of new U.S. term business and putting on effectively all the future profits, future surplus on our balance sheet because of how efficient we'd structured the internal structure for the term assurance. So therefore, instead of that, we're now getting that in cash. So we get GBP 1.8 billion of real cash instead of the future surpluses coming through in our surplus generation. That is still a multiple. Even if you look at then, what does that mean in pure capital terms?
We say GBP 1.2 billion after all the moving parts, GBP 1.2 billion of capital surplus, which is around at least five times of the surplus generation of that particular book. In tangible assets, instead of future surplus generation, removes that uncertainty, volatility. And of course, the solvency goes up by 22% as a result of that. So you can see these are big numbers. There is a significant improvement in where we are. We then get to, to your point around dividend cover. So we've had this cash. We've had 22% surplus. We clearly then have looked at all of the plans and projections with the board.
We're very comfortable to then give back GBP 1 billion of that surplus that we generate, the cash that we have, because we're very confident in the very predictable surpluses that we have, thrown off the remainder of the business, the opportunities for growth beyond that, and the capital efficiency of writing, in particular, the U.K. PRT business. All means that we're very comfortable with the dividend cover, the strain dynamics, and where we would end up in terms of surplus generation for that book. That was the sort of dynamics around it. There's a lot of moving parts. Anyone that wants to, we can talk to people afterwards around U.S. deduction and aggregation and Bermuda and everything else. There's a lot of moving parts within there. There's some big numbers which are all positive for us and accelerate all this surplus emergence.
In terms of the model and strain, there isn't really any change. We will continue to be very capital efficient in the way we write the U.S. PRT. We will obviously work very closely with them. And to António's point and your point, we'll work on what is the best balance sheet structure for that, how can we make the best possible offering for the market. And that will be a lot of the day two activity, if you like, post-closing, and to determine how we best take that to market. But in terms of pure strain for us, it will be very similar to what we've been doing in the past. There's no addition from this. And we will optimize it using the entities that we have.
Thank you. Thank you, Jeff. And thank you, Andrew. And as Jeff said, there are moving parts, but this is clearly a creative transaction for us. And as you can see from our tone, we feel very, very positive about it. So next question from Nasib Ahmed from UBS. Hi, Nasib. Good morning.
Hey, morning, guys. Thanks for taking my question. So firstly, sort of coming back onto the surplus, and maybe if you help us kind of understand the duration of the GBP 200-GBP 250, what's the duration of that business in terms of the surplus? Is it five years and you've just got that upfront? And then the way I was thinking about the GBP 5-GBP 6 billion, why not upgrade that target? You're getting GBP 1.2 billion today. If you invest the GBP 800 million at 14%, you get another GBP 100 million. You're losing what, GBP 350 million times that by three. You still get a positive benefit from what you've done today. So why not upgrade the GBP 5-GBP 6 billion? And then second question on funds, what's the loss of funds of doing all of this on a Solvency II basis?
And then finally, on slide six, António , on the gray dots that you still haven't addressed, how are you progressing with those? What's the net asset value of those gray dots that you've got a bias to exit? Thanks.
Thank you. Nasib, you were breaking a bit in the second question. I think it wasn't quite clear. Could you repeat that?
It was just the Own Funds loss from doing the transaction today.
So let me address. Actually, Jeff is thinking about that. So he'll answer in a second. Let me just answer the first question, which is on the GBP 5-6 billion. What we are saying is that we've increased our confidence to deliver the GBP 5-6 billion. I take your point about upgrading it. But what we have done is that we've crystallized GBP 1.2 billion of that. So we feel more confident to achieve the target. But yes, I like to be ambitious but realistic and then overdeliver. So I'm not changing the target. But yes, we've increased our confidence. And if you think about the range, we're closer to the top end rather than the bottom end. But yes, that is the target. And I feel more confident today, having announced this, than I did yesterday. On the other.
Yes. So the Own Funds, it's actually the opposite. The solvency goes up by 22%. And that's a combination of additional Own Funds.
Before the share buyback and after the share buyback, it's 7%.
Yeah, and that's a combination of additional Own Funds. We've received more than is going off the balance sheet and a removal of SCR capital requirements from the business, so it's a combination of the two, and so there's an increase from that.
Sorry, I was just asking about the Own Funds that are coming off from the businesses that you've sold, 20% of PRT and U.S. protection. What was the total Own Funds of that business?
I mean, it isn't the right answer. But if we're getting GBP 1.8 billion in cash, but the capital surplus benefit is GBP 1.2 billion, then some of the difference must be some of the Own Funds that's gone off. It's more complicated than that because of the way that we consolidate the U.S. business through deduction and aggregation and that we have VIF on our balance sheet in different places. So it's more complicated than that. But it's clearly the difference. We just got the cash in. It was up by GBP 1.8 billion. The surplus is going up by GBP 1.2 billion, as we say. So some of that difference will have been Own Funds that went out as part of the transaction. But it's still a net positive overall.
On the corporate investments unit, which is slide six, that reports to Jeff. Actually, he and I had the conversation earlier this week where we went asset by asset on.
He wasn't chasing me.
Yeah, no, a lot of good progress, actually, and we have, and this is an important point, we have named people for each one of the assets. Of course, as you know, Nasib, they're much smaller assets than Cala, which was the GBP 1.35 billion disposal we did.
Yeah, that's right. So it was around GBP 2 billion at the time we set it up. So we sold just over half of that, at least, was sold through Cala. It's a longer list of assets now. Some of those are still material in the sort of hundreds of millions. But it gets smaller and smaller and they vary from a plot of land for GBP 10 million to slightly larger businesses and fintechs.
As António says, we have a plan for every single one of those for them to not be here over the planned period that we have and to not be owning those at the end. Some of those are going faster than we anticipated. Others, as ever, are slower so we will be updating as we see those. But they won't be the equivalent of large announcements within that. But we're comfortable with the progress we're making.
Yeah. And each time we do our results, we'll give you a bit of an update. As Jeff says, they don't merit a specific sort of one-off announcement because these are small assets. But yeah, we're getting on with it. And your first question, Nasib, was the GBP 200 million-GBP 250 million. Do you want to add to that? He was talking about duration and kind of how we think about it.
Oh, sorry. Yes, well, it was the surplus.
It was linked to the surplus.
Yeah, that's right. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's sort of what you're saying. But as I say, it's very dependent on continuing to write increasing volumes of U.S. protection business. So it sort of happens on day one. We are being paid for, I mean, term business normally has a duration of about seven years maximum anyway. And you're being paid for all of that upfront every time within the GBP 200 on your balance sheet. And so they've effectively, if you like, paid us for five years' worth of future new business production in the GBP 200 million is one way to think about that.
Thank you. So thank you, Nasib. Larissa, Larissa van Deventer, if I pronounce your surname correctly, Larissa from Barclays. Hi, Larissa. Good morning.
Good morning, and that is a very good point. Thank you, António. Thinking of the balance between the U.K. and the U.S. PRT markets in light of this transaction, we have two questions. The first one is, how should we think about your focus on U.K. versus U.S. in capital allocation going forward? And the second one is, if you can please give a little bit more color around the GBP 400 million and how exactly that will be applied and what you hope to achieve with that.
Larissa, the GBP 400 million you're saying, the GBP 400 million, there's two GBP 400 millions. There's a GBP 400 million, which we are applying to the U.S. PRT business. And there's the remainder, which happens to be GBP 400 million.
No, the U.S. PRT GBP 400 million.
Okay, okay. Great, great. So Jeff will address that. Let me address the first question. Actually, Jeff and I were discussing this morning. Of course, this morning, we are talking about U.S. protection. We're talking about U.S. PRT and then global asset management. But if you really step back and everything we've been doing since I took over as CEO and the strategy we announced, of course, our largest market continues to be the U.K. And we feel very strongly about the opportunities we have in the U.K. We will be talking to you in a few weeks' time about our full year results for 2024. But we were very explicit about U.K. PRT and what we did last year and the pipeline that we discussed to you back in December. We're very positive about that business. I keep on talking about asset management globally.
And I talk about the 40% that are outside the U.K. But we are the largest British asset manager. And of course, 60% of it is in the U.K. So the U.K. continues to absolutely be the growth focus for our business. And importantly, in our third business, in retail, there is a very important decision that we've made that this transaction crystallizes. Our retail business is fully focused on the U.K. We have 12 million customers in the U.K., a very strong brand, been around for 189 years. And this was the one business, U.S. protection was the one retail business we had outside the U.K. So again, from a sharper focus perspective, this is the market where we have the brand, where we have the reputation, where we have the credibility to continue to grow and invest in retail.
The balance here is I talked a lot this morning about how exciting the U.S. is for us as a growth opportunity. But Larissa, in many ways, that balance doesn't change. We are very strong on the U.K. and the growth there. But if anything, back to the previous question, we want to now, with a strong partner, continue to grow U.S. PRT. But the strategy I announced in June from a balance perspective doesn't really change. This is an execution of that strategy. Do you want to talk about the GBP 400 million in terms of U.S. PRT?
Yes. So yes, sure. So as I said earlier, some of that is to back the business on day one that we have. And I'll explain that. And the rest is then over a planning period for new U.S. PRT business, not by any means all incremental to our plan. As you can tell by the numbers, it's in the ballpark of the sort of strain we would have had in our plan already for writing that PRT. So what I mean is, on day one, we have the U.S. PRT split over the U.S. balance sheet and some of it in Bermuda. You can see all of this from all our various returns that we have and entities. And so some of those net assets will be going to Meiji Yasuda as part of what they're buying. And some of those will be coming to us.
In order to reinsure some of that in force, we will be putting a small amount of the GBP 400 million up on day one to back the in force reinsurance that we're taking on the rest of that to get us to 80%, where they are taking the net assets. But that's relatively small within the GBP 400 million. And then the rest is to fund the PRT business as we go forward in the entity that we reinsure into, which will probably be somewhere in Bermuda. We're still looking at the optimal structure around those and what it would look like. And so simply backing that, we would hope in some ways that we use at least all of the GBP 400 million because we're writing extra volumes with them.
But it's still very capital efficient, similar strain levels to what we've seen, and similar strain levels to what we would have talked about previously across the whole business. So we don't really see much of a change in that dynamic. The big variable will be the amount of volume that we're able to write over the period.
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Larissa. So Mandeep Jagpal from RBC. Mandeep, good morning.
Hey, morning,António , Jeff. Mandeep Jagpal, RBC Capital Markets. Thanks for taking my questions. Just two left for me, please. The first one is on the 80% retention of the economic interest in U.S. PRT, which means that the originating partner has a relatively small amount of skin in the game. How much influence do you guys get over the type of business that will be written by the partner? And I'm thinking here in terms of the nature of the liabilities that are underwritten. And then also related to the U.S. PRT relationship, the release states it's a long-term partnership. Are you able to let us know if it's an open-ended agreement, or does it have a specific end date? Thank you.
Thank you. And Mandeep, on your second question, you're saying the broader long-term partnership, if it's was that what you said?
That's right, yeah.
Yeah, so I'll start there. And then, Jeff, you should talk about the 80%. It is an open-ended long-term partnership. Obviously, the different aspects of this have different. We expect to be here. They are one of the. They're the oldest life insurance company in Japan. We are 189 years old this year. One of the things that, over this transaction, has been this partnership has been discussed over a very long period of time. And one of the things I found is that there's a very strong alignment of values and culture between Meiji Yasuda and L&G. We expect this partnership to be very sort of long-standing and long-term, as we've said. In terms of the 80% economic interest?
Actually, the two go together because it's very much a partnership. I can say, and we'll be telling the people when they get out of bed in Stamford, that nothing changes. They are all going to be sitting together and working in the same way as they have been working. A small number of those will be making some L&G risk management decisions and pricing decisions. Others will be making some Meiji Yasuda decisions. We will decide all of that together. How do we optimize that, agree in advance, and then really go to market and see how much we can write and what that can look like? Nothing will change in that way. Clearly, some of this and the setting of the 80/20 was so that there was shared economics within the business.
And some of this is, PRT is new to Meiji Yasuda. They want to understand it. They want to grow their understanding. They want to learn from us. They want us to be guiding and steering that business. And the asset management investment side of that is key, as you all know, to the profitability of that business. So it's very much a partnership, people working together, whether that's António's level, my counterpart, or whether it is on the ground, the CEO of the PRT business working with our Bermudan operations. And nothing will change in terms of that setup. It's just some will be employed by one, some will be employed by another. But we will absolutely be going to market to push the PRT market as hard as possible.
Thank you. So Andrew Sinclair from Bank of America. Hi, António. Good morning.
Good morning, guys. I like the transaction. Well done. So three from me, please. First, pretty simply, just could you remind us the total remittances from these businesses over the last few years, just in terms of cash remittance coming out of them? Second was just you've sold U.S. protection because I guess it doesn't really fit into the flywheel per se the same way. Why keep U.K. protection? A great business, but are you the best owner? Third, António, you mentioned a few times about the importance of returning more than 50% of the proceeds for this deal. Why shouldn't we think that more than 50% of the Cala proceeds should be coming back?
Thanks. Thank you, Andy. You get to ask that question several times, the Cala one. So look, Jeff should absolutely address the remittances point. Let me address it. I can address the Cala one as well. But let me address the U.K. This is an important question. Thank you, Andy, for raising it. So when I look at the portfolio of businesses and that forensic review that we've done, the size of our presence in the U.K. overall, so going back to the 12 million customers we have across all of our retail businesses, the size of our presence itself in terms of market share in both individual protection and group protection, and that sort of halo of the brand, and then the diversification of us having mortality and longevity risk within our book and the capital benefits of that, absolutely, U.K. protection is strategic to us.
Obviously, it's a big contributor to our dividend payment. It's a very strategic business for us going forward. It's very different, actually. We didn't set out to necessarily sell U.S. protection in this way. We have a partnership with Meiji Yasuda that particularly allows us to sell our U.S. insurance entity but continue to do PRT. That, for us, was critical. As I said, with a very attractive multiple. This is it from a protection perspective. Remittances and Cala?
Yeah, the remittances reasonably straightforward. I mean, it's been roughly GBP 100 million of dividends, as we've talked about for many years. We're coming out from the U.S. protection business. Obviously, at the same time, we've been growing the U.S. PRT business that's either been Cala efficient, or we have been putting better capital into the Bermuda entities. But the simplest version is you have seen over the years 100 million dividend coming back from the U.S. protection entity. And we've talked about that for actually, as long as I've been here, I think it was been the answer.
And then, yeah, Cala. So I think it's the combination of impacts. This transaction is GBP 1.2 billion of surplus generation, no capital improvement, 22% on solvency post-closing without the dividend, and then GBP 1.8 billion of cash. Whereas Cala's GBP 100 million of capital, and you get the cash associated for that.
If we then arbitrarily chose to pay back the whole amount that we'd received, that would be 15% off solvency, even though it had only improved by just over 1% from doing the transaction. So it would be quite an arbitrary decision to say, we just have extra capital. We're going to give it back because we've got some liquidity. Well, we could do that at any time. We don't have to do that because we have the transaction. So that's how we sort of think about it differently in the dynamics of the two different transactions. And we flagged that all along that, look, that is what happens from doing the Cala transaction. So I understand where you're coming from, Andy. But that's how we think about the different dynamics of two very different types of transactions.
Also, if you look at what we included on slide 9, which is where I sort of build so I am actually referring on slide 9 to the capital release of Cala. But now you put all of this together. And actually, Andy, you and I and many others on this call have had this discussion. We said we would return more to shareholders. And that's absolutely what we're doing. We're returning more than GBP 5 billion over the next three years. By the way, that's on top of the GBP 200 million we already did for 2024, so the first share buyback program that we did. And so I feel that this is striking that right balance between an ambitious growth strategy where we're investing to grow the business but with substantial returns for shareholders. Thank you, Andy. Dominic O'Mahony from BNP. Dom, good morning. How are you?
Good morning. Yes, I'm well, thanks. Hope you're all well as well. So strategy side, very clear. Thank you for explaining. And I hope this is a real boost to the Real Assets strategy. Can I ask you a few financial questions? The first is just on the reinsurance piece, the GBP 400 million that's going in. So Jeff, you were clear that a small amount of this is upfront, and the remainder is essentially the flow of strain. So just to be clear, if I were to take that GBP 400 million out, the NSG going forwards would be slightly higher, right? I mustn't be double counting those things. Or to put it another way, that GBP 400 million, if I look at your capital disclosure, you said the ratio goes up 22%, 7% after the buyback. Is that 7% before or after the GBP 400 million?
So do I have to then spend some of that GBP 400 million out of the 7%? The second question is just I really want to be crystal clear on the capital generation from the protection book. The GBP 350 million-GBP 400 million of gross, GBP 200 million-GBP 250 million net. If you didn't sell this business, would we be expecting this on a run rate basis? Jeff, you were really clear on the capital efficiency of it, which makes it sound like a really attractive business. Just is it that you were saying that actually that GBP 200 million-GBP 250 million is not fully sustainable, or is that actually the sort of the run rate? And then the third question is just the implication for strain in the U.K. I might have thought that U.S. protection was highly diversifying.
Does that mean that the SCR written on new U.K. PRT might be a bit higher on a run rate basis because you don't get the diversification from the U.S.? Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Dom. So no is the answer to that third question. But so you should be reassured. On the other two, so reinsurance and the 7%, and then the GBP 200-GBP 250 million.
No, on the latter, the total loss of diversification as a percentage of our total SCR is minuscule. So no, it doesn't impact on that, even though you've got mortality and longevity, but just because of the way that we'd set that up and where the different entities are within that. Yeah, so on the reinsurance and the 7%, so the 22% is sort of what we would have on closing, let's call it at the end of 2025. So what would be the impact you would see at that point? And at that point, we would say, well, look, the U.S. business was gone. We had some surplus generation from that. It's been replaced. And now we've got the money in. And the solvency we'd give you would be 22% higher than the day before. The 7% is then the equivalent number if we simply repay GBP 1 billion.
So the answer is some of the 400 is already in that because we'll have written more business in 2025, and we'll have put the reinsurance structure in place. Some of it will be to come. But I think the important point is it's already in your models because we were already writing U.S. PRT, and you were already all assuming we were doing that. So it's definitely not incremental and something new that needs to be taken off over the next five years that you didn't have in there already. I don't think there's any more on that. The OSG, as I say, we've been a victim of our success here in having a hugely efficient term business, which has allowed us to grow this business.
It is something great for Meiji Yasuda to inherit in terms of capital efficiency and what that can do for pricing in the market there. In terms of is it sustainable, it has some slightly different dynamics. If it was right, if we were writing the same volumes increasing, I mean, we were record volumes we've talked about the previous year. We've already said that 2024 was a good volume. Then you do get close to that sort of GBP 200 million of net surplus generation. But as I say, all you're really getting credit for is all the future profits of that block of new business that you've just written, which is a risk on your balance sheet that you're writing on an ongoing basis. It would be like me saying, well, we just won an asset management mandate.
Can we put the capital on our balance sheet for the next 20 years of fees, please, assuming the market's going to go up at 5% per annum forever? That's the equivalent of what that 200 represents for the term book. We're saying, give us all the future profits now, and it happens to be in our balance sheet. So all of this was in what you projected in terms of the 1.8 billion of OSG that most people have. And that would now drop closer to the 1.4-1.5 going forward, and so to cover the dividend and the strain levels that you have, but removing the strain that was already in there for the term book.
And so that's where we get very comfortable with the net surplus generation versus dividend and the flexibility we have, starting from a very, very strong solvency position that has then increased even after giving back a GBP 1 billion.
Yeah. And therefore, as we said earlier, we're more confident today about hitting our OSG targets than we were before. Thank you, Dom. Abid Hussain. Abid, good morning. You may be muted, Abid.
Can you hear me now?
You can.
Apologies. Three quick questions, if I can. The first one is on the transaction multiples. Thanks for sharing the earnings multiple and the net assets multiple and the capital generation multiple. I was just wondering, can you sort of give us a sense of what the multiple will look like on an Own Funds, sort of hypothetical Own Funds basis? From the discussion earlier, it looks like you're suggesting it's around sort of one and a half times. So I just want to get a sense of is my thinking right on the Own Funds multiple? And then the second one is on the reinsurance arrangement specifically. Is there any length of that, or is that also indefinite?
And is there any sort of terms within the contract that you might want to highlight that the partner could use to exit? So under what arrangements would they exit that agreement? And then the final one is on the share buyback. Look, the share price is up today. If the share price continues to sort of trend upwards towards the end of the year, would you still do a buyback? Is there a level at which you decide not to do a buyback and do something else?
There is, Abid. So look, just on that, we obviously like the transaction. Actually, I think it was Andy that said that earlier. You can see that. And I think the market seems to like the transaction, which is good. I think the share price is still a long way to go before we would hit that point. But yes, we always talked about returning more capital to shareholders. And if you remember back in June, I talked about at that point, at this point, clearly, share buybacks are the best way to do that. But we're still a long way from that. So that would be a good problem to have. Just in terms of the transaction multiples, look, we've looked at it in every single way. I mean, every single transaction multiple is, I see it, a very attractive transaction multiple.
Yeah, that.
I don't think the calculation you did was actually correct.
No, that calculation, it is not correct and it doesn't work that way because this is a deduction and aggregation entity in the U.S. that is coming into our Solvency II calculation. There are restrictions on what we have within our entity and what we're unable to take credit for in our group calculation. We can talk you through it. Whatever it is, 250%-275% of CAL is what you have to lock in and what you have back in it. So we can talk you through that. But that's why we gave if you're doing if someone's buying a U.S. entity, what is the net assets they're getting on a statutory basis? That's the $850 million. That is what Meiji Yasuda are buying, a legal entity with an approximate. We haven't finished the calculations. Yeah, $850 million of net assets. That is how people look at the calculation.
So the 2.3 is related to that. Clearly, there are other moving parts, but those are the net assets that they are getting. And those are the net assets that we don't have. But that isn't what is in our solvency calculation. But we're happy we can talk you through it.
Exactly. I think it's worth doing a follow-up with you specifically on this thing. Like the 2.7 times net assets and the 30 times earnings, those are very clear multiples under any transaction. Those are attractive multiples. We can talk you through kind of in detail through that. The reinsurance arrangements and the partnership with Meiji Yasuda?
Yeah, well, clearly, reinsurance is reinsurance forever. It backs the liability to the policyholder. So that is in force forever, and we have it there. Clearly, if either of us decide we don't want to do U.S. PRT at some point in the future for whatever reason, we'll have a discussion about the best way to go forward. And people will be able to stop new business. But that's a completely different conversation too. Is the reinsurance there? The U.S. PRT arrangement is seen as ongoing while it makes money for both parties. And we are long-term partners more generally at the corporate levels. And so we're very excited about that.
We think it has great upside opportunities for us in growing PRT, not just balance sheets and everything else, but the alignment around private assets, being able to grow into other asset classes using both our balance sheets in the U.S. as a potential to then be able to grow those and how efficient we can make the pricing as a result of sourcing other different assets with other people's co-investment as well as our own to grow those.
Yeah, great. Andrew Crean from Autonomous. Hi, Andrew. Good morning. Is Andrew muted as well? I think Andrew might be muted as well. Can you hear me now, Andrew?
Yeah, you got me there. Okay, great. Look, there's been quite a lot of questioning. Can you just actually tell us either now or after, what is the amount that you're losing in terms of the net assets, the CSM after tax, the Own Funds, and the SCR, just so we're absolutely clear on those factors? Secondly, the 30 times earnings, is there any depression in the U.S. Protection earnings in 2024? Because I noticed in if you use 2022 numbers under IFRS 4, the multiple would be only 13 times. So there's a bit of a tension here between an extremely high P multiple on which you're exiting, and yet the very low multiple of operating free surplus generation. And then the third question is a broader question in terms of the portfolio of the business.
One thing you could have done with the money is retain it as a war chest to acquire businesses in the U.K., and certainly, there has been some question about your lack of U.S./U.K. asset gathering businesses. Are you really saying, given the fact you're prepared to return so much of the proceeds here, that you're absolutely happy with the portfolio of your businesses over the next five years, and you don't think you need to build or acquire something to strengthen the overall U.K. presence?
Thank you, Andrew. I'll start with that, and then I'll ask Jeff to go to the other two. So I think we've reflected a lot on this, Andrew. I think this is exactly the right balance between us returning more to shareholders on the back of what we believe is a very attractive transaction, but also retaining capacity to grow because we are retaining the GBP 400 million, which partially is capacity to grow in U.S. PRT, but the other GBP 400 million gives us additional flexibility to grow. Also, you step back from our overall solvency position. We already have a lot of that strategic flexibility within our current position and our plan before we did this transaction. So it's a judgment, Andrew, as you say.
We want to reassure people that we are returning more than 50%, but clearly, we're not returning all of it because we see those growth opportunities both organically and through bolt-on acquisitions. We have more capacity to do that going forward. So we had lots of debates ourselves and with our board about what's the right balance. And I believe the GBP 1 billion additional share buyback strikes that right balance between ambitious growth strategy and returning more to shareholders. The two other questions, which are actually linked, maybe you can go to multiples first, IFRS 4, IFRS 17.
Yeah, sure. So yeah, CSM, obviously, we haven't given that. Again, it would be a good multiple of that business. I mean, we know the duration of this, so you can work out if it runs off at 7-10 years duration for term business. And it's a proportion of the profits that we've given, so you can see that. But that's something we'll do when we do the fuller calculations. When we start disclosing these separately, then we'll be able to see that. And so some of that will be at the full year results if we decide to start showing sort of discontinued operations, et cetera. But we probably won't split everything out immediately, but just maybe give some extra disclosure because obviously, we want people to be able to project the correct answer going forward.
Linked to that, because CSM is IFRS, there's nothing particularly strange in the $90 million. As you say, if you go backwards, you can see what the total protection did in 2023. You wouldn't get an answer outlined. There was more COVID in 2023, so people have to remember that. That would have had more of an impact on the U.S. business in 2023. There's only a small amount of adverse mortality claims in 2024. And then, as you say, IFRS 4, you get a completely different answer if you go back further, just different bases. Own funds, as I say, it doesn't quite work that way. I mean, the proxy is, well, look, GBP 1.2 billion of surplus is what we're better off afterwards, and we received GBP 1.8 billion of cash. And so some of that is, well, we had GBP 850 million of net assets.
We're not receiving those, but we won't take a credit for all of those in our group calculation by any means because they were restricted under the way you do deduction aggregation, and then there would have been some of this VIF capital that we were losing. That gets you back to the difference between the two, which is a reasonable proxy for the amount of actual own fund. There's obviously capital that has been capital requirement that's been released, which is why you get such a big improvement in the ratio and how you get to the GBP 1.2 billion. So I don't think it would be wrong. I'll probably get told off that this isn't right.
If you were sort of thinking that it's of the 1.2 billion benefit, half of that is sort of Own Funds that we lost, and half of that is capital release, if you like. And then so 1.8, lose 600 of Own Funds. 1.2 is half of that is Own Funds. Half of that is SCR, roughly, if that makes sense. So we lose a third, gain a third, and gain another third from the capital requirement.
What do we do, Andrew? We do two things. Obviously, we haven't yet disclosed our full year results.
No, we haven't.
Part of this is in four weeks' time, as you know, on the 12th of March, we will have the full year results where we have the full 2024 numbers for the U.S. protection business. So we'll do that. But also after this call, we can give kind of more specificity on the calculations.
It's roughly three lots of 600, roughly, roughly, but as you say, we're still doing the calculations for the year-end and the final Solvency II position, but 600 Own Funds we had, 600 of benefit in Own Funds after the transaction, and 600 of SCR release, so that gives you the different numbers, roughly, and the net assets are the net assets we just told you, $150 million.
Yes. That's the 2.7.
That is what they're buying. Those are the net assets.
Exactly.
Everything else in any other entity comes to us.
Thank you. Thank you, Andrew. Thomas Bateman from Mediobanca.
Hi, morning, everybody. I hope you can hear me well. I'm just interested in the long-term ambitions for the U.S. PRT market. So could you just remind us what the U.S. PRT strain is? So what does that GBP 400 million capital mean in terms of volumes? And then I'm also thinking about how you offset that kind of GBP 200-250 million of NSG. So what guidance can you give us on U.S. PRT, OSG, and maybe any potential tailwinds in terms of the asset management flows? And then just a couple of other points. So on the GBP 200-250 million of NSG, does that include the 20% portion from U.S. PRT, or is it just U.S. protection? So I'm just looking for the breakdown between the two. And then very final question, what's the return on capital of the U.S. protection business and the U.S. PRT business?
Thank you. Quite a lot of questions there. I normally give a limit of three, but well, well done fitting them in, so U.S. PRT, so I actually didn't go through this when I was speaking, but on slide seven, we gave some of the attractiveness of the U.S. PRT market, the sort of it's a $3 trillion market, actually different from the U.K. There's less of it that's been insured to date, only 11% in the U.S. compared to 16% in the U.K., so if you think about it, the U.S. PRT market will take longer to run off, if you think about it that way, and therefore, there's a bigger opportunity both in terms of absolute number, but also in terms of duration and kind of the length of that opportunity. We don't disclose separately the strain for the U.S. business.
But linking that to your last question, and I'll ask Jeff to answer the other ones, which is every single dollar that we are investing, we have a return on capital above 14%. So you should be reassured that the return on capital for our business is above 14%. And that's a discipline that I've put in place for every business, and that's true for the U.S. business as well. Do you want to talk about the 200-250 million and the asset management flows?
Yeah. I mean, the first bit is whether the 20% of PRT is within that. It is within that, but honestly, it's immaterial. I mean, it's rounding to the variation within the protection business. So it doesn't really make that much difference if you think of the scale of the book, and it's only 20% of that. And so those numbers are correct with or without it in terms of a range. Yeah, in terms of positives and the way we think about the net surplus generation offset, yeah, clearly we're looking to grow asset management fees. We also have seen hopefully some rates will come down and markets go up, which also increases that. But as we add these higher margin products, we see that come through in higher surplus generation from those businesses. Of course, the buyback also reduces the difference.
We gain about GBP 100 million, at least in net surplus generation just from cumulative buybacks in our models as well. And so we are very comfortable with that. And then the growing position from there, we would certainly be looking to grow OSG faster than the dividend is growing at 2%, which gives us upside. And you've seen that we're very capital efficient on our key business, which is really U.K. PRT. That's where most of our capital goes. We apply the same discipline to individual annuities and make that very capital efficient. And so we will continue to do that and have lots of optionality around that to write very capital efficient volumes. And don't forget, I mean, if you add up all the numbers, we're starting from a very high solvency position.
We've always said we're comfortable in the short term if we want to write even more volume to eat into that and reduce that over time whilst returning considerable amounts to shareholders.
And on the asset management point, we have committed, as you've seen, to do a capital markets event similar to the one we did in December for PRT for institutional retirement. We're going to do one in the first half for asset management. And this is where we really will be talking about the detail of our strategy and the execution of what we announced last year in terms of asset management. And yes, the asset management profits go straight into OSG, right? So that's the nature of that business. And the more we improve the margins, as Jeff says, and we continue to grow the volumes, including the partnership with Meiji Yasuda, those will be fee revenues that we'll have into asset management. And that also flows through to OSG. Thank you. Michael Huttner from Berenberg. How are you, Michael? Good morning.
Good morning. Thank you so much. I only have one, well, two. One is the closing. I think you indicated end of the year, but maybe some precision, and then the leverage. Can you remind us where you are now and how much does it change?
Yes, thank you. On the closing, we expect to close towards the end of this year. Yes, leverage.
Yeah, well, I mean, we were in the mid-20s on a Solvency II basis. We're under 30% on most of the key rating agency metrics. I mean, I think we sort of need to finally land with them how they do the IFRS 17. Clearly, with a higher solvency position, retaining a few hundred millions of cash, then that position reduces, so it looks even healthier.
Yeah, and as you know, for us, Michael, it hasn't been a particular concern compared to other insurance companies, so thank you, and I think the last question is for Marcus Rivaldi from Jefferies. Marcus.
Good morning, everybody. Two questions for me. One more strategic. So the growth opportunity from this partnership in U.S. PRT, is it really mainly from Meiji Yasuda providing that 20% capital support to new business going forward? Or is there opportunity to leverage their existing insurance assets in the U.S. and relationships in the U.S.? And then secondly, another leverage-related question, please. Given there is a movement in the SCR down, does this create any implications for how you're managing the mix and amount of debt leverage, debt outstanding, sorry, on a go-forward basis? I know you've got a call in October later on this year. Does it change your plans around that, for example? Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, Marcus. On PRT, this, and actually, it's a good question for us to finish on, because if you think about the opportunity here, there's a very attractive multiples, different multiples on U.S. protection. But we're very excited about the partnership with Meiji Yasuda and how we grow U.S. PRT. We're bringing our own expertise as the best PRT player in the world with the additional balance sheet that we have from them, which I mentioned post-closing, they will have $80 billion of insurance assets. And that's really it in a way. So as Jeff says, the team that sits in Stamford, Connecticut is the same team. They will be co-located with the people that are working for Meiji Yasuda and people that are working for L&G. So in many ways, nothing changes if you think about it that way.
What I said strategically in terms of growth of that business is exactly the same as we said in June of last year. Then we reinforced that in our December capital markets event. Jeff, on SCR?
Yeah, no, obviously, it's a good spot. As I said, we're very conscious of it. We monitor it over various interest rate scenarios, which is really the biggest driver of the SCR. It's not a huge reduction as a result of this. We'll come down, but we've modeled all the different scenarios. It doesn't cause a constraint or cause us to think about those differently. We'll make the decisions on an economic basis around leverage and the different capital tiering.
Great. Well, thank you, everybody. Thank you for joining us today. As you can see, we are very happy with this transaction. I think Andy said we like it. And we're very happy not just with the transaction, but particularly with the strategic partnership with Meiji Yasuda that allows us to keep on growing, particularly in the U.S., as we were just saying in several of the questions you've asked us. This is, for me, another proof point of our strategy, right? This is our strategy in action and the value creation for shareholders. And go back to we're returning 40% of our market cap in a combination of dividends and share buybacks. And we're doing that while retaining the strategic flexibility of growing the business. It's really that balance that Andrew Crean was asking earlier. I hope that these strategic benefits are clear to you as well.
It's great that we spent quite a lot of time on Q&A. But after this discussion, if you have any further questions, please contact me, Jeff, or our investor relations team. Very happy to get into the numbers and really explain what has been for us. We've been living with this transaction for a while. So I appreciate we've just announced it at 7:00 A.M. this morning. We're very positive about it. If we don't talk, we look forward to seeing you actually in four weeks or so on the 12th of March for our full year results. Thank you.