Legal & General, one of the UK’s largest pension providers, has said it planned for a 50-50 probability of a Brexit ahead of last week’s referendum, and positioned its balance sheet accordingly, “to reduce risk for our customers and shareholders”.
However, the firm’s share price fell by 13% between the close of market between Thursday and Monday evening.
In a statement, the firm said: “We undertook a number of derisking actions in respect of our asset portfolios, including the traded equities held within our shareholder funds, before the referendum to mitigate our balance sheet against the downside risk of a “leave” vote.”
Also included in the statement was a reference to surplus capital the firm has on its balance sheets to comply with the Solvency II directive, which came into force earlier this year.
The firm has a Solvency II capital surplus of around £5 billion (€6 billion), which it says demonstrates its resilience to market volatility, “including that caused to date by the EU referendum outcome”.
The firm’s shares closed up by 7.88% yesterday.
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