Pension Buyouts Likely to Be Bolder, if Not Bigger, in 2019

Lucrative pension risk transfer deals aren’t just ballooning in size: They’re evolving to capture constituencies beyond traditional retirees.

Handoffs from employers looking to purge retirement costs by transferring pension liabilities to insurance companies who cover the promised benefits have been going on for decades. Prudential closed its first PRT deal in 1928; the New Jersey-based financial services firm told Bloomberg Law it’s still cutting checks to the two remaining beneficiaries of the Cleveland Public Library transfer today.

Prior to 2012, analysts say, this segment of the market generated maybe $1 billion to $2 billion in transfer deals per year—compared with ...