BB&T Insurance Holdings, which is owned by financial services firm BB&T Corp., has agreed to acquire another bank-owned insurance broker, Regions Insurance Group, from Regions Financial Corp.
No terms were disclosed.
Memphis-based Regions Insurance is a mostly retail insurance broker with offices in 10 states: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas. In 2017, it sold about $1.5 billion in premiums in property/casualty and employee benefits products to businesses.
Regions Insurance also has a wholesale insurance division, Insurisk, based in Little Rock, Arkansas, which accounts for about eight percent of its business. Insurisk is also included in the sale.
This acquisition of Regions Insurance, with its almost $2 billion in annual revenue, “adds incremental balance” to BB&T’s insurance business between its wholesale and retail insurance channels and further builds its footprint across core markets in the Southeast, according to BB&T’s chairman and chief executive officer, Kelly S. King.
Following this acquisition, BB&T Insurance’s retail network will contribute almost half of its insurance brokerage revenue. Currently about 46 percent of BB&T’s insurance business is retail and 56 percent is wholesale. For Region Insurance, 92 percent is retail. After closing, BB&T’s business profile will be 49 percent retail and 51 percent wholesale, according to figures from BB&T.
Rick Ulmer, president and chief executive officer of Regions Insurance, and other Regions Insurance associates, will join BB&T Insurance in senior leadership and other positions, according to the announcement.
This transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2018.
BB&T Insurance Holdings, the fifth largest insurance broker, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Winston-Salem, North Carolina-based BB&T Corp. BB&T Insurance Holdings operates 200 offices through subsidiaries BB&T Insurance Services, BB&T Insurance Services of California, McGriff, Seibels & Williams, CRC Insurance Services, Crump Life Insurance Services and AmRisc.
Regions entered the insurance agency business with the acquisition of Rebsamen Insurance, an Arkansas agency, in 2001. Over the next several years, Regions added numerous insurance agencies including ICT Insurance in Louisiana, Consolidated Insurance in Texas, Miles and Finch in Indiana and Barksdale Bonding and Insurance in Mississippi.
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