Beazley Rejects Zurich’s $10.3 Billion Takeover Offer

• By: AnneMarie McPherson Spears
• January 22, 2026

Earlier this week, Zurich Insurance Group AG made a £7.7 billion bid to buy Beazley Plc on Monday, which was rejected today by Beazley. The offer was equivalent to $10.3 billion and was the fifth proposal by Swiss-based insurer Zurich to acquire UK-based specialty insurer Beazley over the past year.

Under the terms submitted to Beazley’s board on Monday, Zurich, Europe’s second-largest insurer by market value, offered to purchase Beazley at 1,280 pence a share in cash, a 56% premium to Beazley’s closing share price of 820 pence on Friday, Jan. 16.

Today, Beazley’s board announced it unanimously rejected Zurich’s latest proposal, saying it “materially undervalues” the company.

“We were a bit nonplussed,” Beazley CEO Adrian Cox told the FT. “We don’t think the price is right, but also we don’t want to fail to recognize the realities of the capitalist world that we’re in.”

The Beazley board said that Zurich’s latest bid was below an earlier proposal in late June, which offered to purchase Beazley for 1,315 pence a share.

“If it makes sense for our shareholders to do a transaction, then we’ll do a transaction,” Cox said. “It just needs to be a Premier League price for a Premier League company.”

Beazley operates in Europe, North America, Latin America, and Asia, with net insurance written premiums of $2.6 billion in the first half of 2025, of which a third comes from property and specialty risks, according to Bloomberg News.

The offer reflected Zurich’s hopes to “create a global leader in specialty insurance with c.$15 billion of gross written premiums, exceptional data availability and underwriting expertise, leading market and distribution capabilities, and outstanding reinsurance and technology infrastructures,” Zurich said in its announcement of the offer on Monday.

The rejection of Zurich’s latest 1,280 pence per share proposal sent Beazley shares down 7% to 1,045 pence, but they later recovered most losses to trade 1% lower at the opening of the London stock market this morning. Beazley’s stock, which gained just 2% in 2025, has surged 40% since the Swiss company’s interest was made public.

AnneMarie McPherson Spears is IA news editor.