Hiscox chooses Luxembourg as EU base

Insurance company Hiscox, which had also been considering Malta as its European base once the UK leaves the EU in 2019, has said that it plans to have a new subsidiary in Luxembourg up and running “well before” the expected Brexit date of March 2019.Hiscox said it had chosen Luxembourg because of its “pro-business position, strong financial services experience and well-respected regulator”.

Luxembourg: the centre of Europe

Bronek Masojada, the company’s CEO, added, “This is going to be the centre of our European business, so it made sense to establish something physically closer to it rather than a bit far away. Luxembourg is in the centre of Europe and it is close to major markets.”Other insurers, including America’s AIG and commercial property insurer FM Global, have already chosen Luxembourg as their post-Brexit bases, while, last week, JP Morgan said it was planning to move up to 1,000 jobs from London to Luxembourg, Dublin and Frankfurt.The decision by Hiscox, however, will not result in any relocation of their 1,200 British workforce, half of whom are based in London. Instead, a handful of new staff will be recruited initially – perhaps by moving workers from the firm’s existing European offices – to man the new Luxembourg base, with numbers expected to increase gradually over time.

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Related news:

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• Japanese banks firm up post-Brexit moves
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Ensuring a seamless transition

The company, which already has 350 staff in seven EU countries, including offices in Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam, said the process of establishing the new Luxembourg office would begin immediately “to ensure a seamless transition for our customers, brokers and business partners” after Brexit.Hiscox, which is headquartered in Bermuda but has been listed on the London Stock Exchange since 1997, has also issued a trading update showing that gross premiums had increased by 17 per cent to £751.2 million in the first quarter of 2017, compared with a year ago.Mr Masojada said, “We have had a strong start to the year thanks to our long-term investment in Hiscox retail, particularly in the small business sector. Hiscox’s London market continues to face challenging conditions.”Hiscox, which specialises in disaster and speciality insurance, employs more than 2,300 staff in 13 countries, including offices in New York and Singapore. Last year, the group wrote gross premiums totalling £2.4 billion and posted a record profit before tax of £354.5 million.For related news and features, visit our Brexit section.Access hundreds of global services and suppliers in our Online Directory  Get access to our free Global Mobility Toolkit

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