Canada's Fairfax buys Brit Insurance

The Lloyd's of London insurer Brit Group has sold its Brit Insurance Ltd subsidiary to the Canadian financial services giant Fairfax Financial in a deal worth about $300m (£190m).

Brit Insurance was put up for sale by its private-equity owners CVC and Apollo last autumn. Brit had invested assets worth about $1.9bn and net reserves of about $1.3bn at the end of March.

In run-off, an insurance company stops writing new business and only manages the existing book of business until all the policies in that book expire.

"We continue to look for opportunities to grow profitably in the run-off area," Fairfax's chief executive, Prem Watsa, said.

Brit Group, which sponsors the England cricket team, will now focus on being a global speciality (re)insurer.

Last month Fairfax bought Thomas Cook's 77 per cent stake in its India operations for about $150m.