Fairfax’s Brit takeover passes key milestone as PE owners accept offer

Canadian insurer Fairfax’s £1.22bn takeover of Brit has passed a key milestone after current private equity (PE) owners CVC and Apollo have accepted Fairfax’s offer.

Fairfax has now received acceptances from shareholders representing 73.42% of Brit’s shares, exceeding the threshold of 70% set out in the offer document.

Most of this amount – 73.31% – belongs to CVC and Apollo.

This means the deal is now unconditional in respect of offer acceptances.

While it has cleared one hurdle, Fairfax’s Brit deal still needs to meet a number of conditions before it can complete. These include regulatory approval from the UK’s FCA, Gibraltar’s Financial Services Commission, and Lloyd’s.