Nordea's purchase of Sampo's Polish life and pension companies has been approved by the authorities in the country and came into effect on December 13, 2005.
The deal gives Nordea Life Holding full ownership of the two companies, Sampo PTE and Sampo Life in Poland and with the buy Nordea acquires a customer base with growth potential. In June 2005, when the agreement was signed, there were 556,000 active pension savers with approximately E600 million. Now there are approximately 595,000 active pension savers with assets under management of around E770 million.
The compulsory pension system is one of the fastest growing segments of the long-term savings market in Poland with an expected growth rate of around 20% annually, said Allan Polack, head of the Life & Pensions division at Nordea.
Through the transaction Nordea more than doubles its customer base in Poland to approximately one million. In addition, Nordea will become a full service provider of savings-related products also offering life and pension products to its existing customer base.
The purchase price is E95 million.