Legal & General, Royal London and WTW/LifeSight are understood to be the three firms in the running to buy NatWest Cushon, according to sources close to Corporate Adviser..
According to media reports, NatWest Group has instructed advisers to sell the workplace master trust provider NatWest Cushon, which has around £3bn AUM.
This proposed sale follows the Government’s planned scale test, which will require DC workplace pension providers to have assets of £10bn by 2030 and a clear plan to reach £25bn by 2035.
All three potential buyers declined to comment on market speculation.
Legal & General is already one of the biggest workplace pension providers with £93.3bn of bundled DC assets and more than 2.5m active members (as at the end of 2024). The acquisition of NatWest Cushon would further consolidate its position in the market.
LifeSight, which is operated through WTW, has grown rapidly in recent years and has been one of the top-performing master trusts, in terms of the investment performance of its default fund, according to CAPA data. It has £21.7bn in AUM (again at the end of last year) . Any purchase of NatWest Cushon would see it comfortably pass the £25bn threshold ahead of the 2030 deadline.
Royal London’s £30.6bn AUM, and is one of the few DC workplace pension providers not to offer a master trust. The acquisition of NatWest Cushon would give it a footprint in this part of the DC market.
NatWest bought a majority stake in Cushon in 2023 for £144m. Cushon’s management retained a 15 per cent stake in the business.
Cushon was initially launched as a workplace Isa provider but moved into the workplace pensions market with a series of acquisitions between 2020 and 2022. This included the Salvus Master Trust, the Workers Pension Trust and the Creative Pension Trust.
As one of the newer master trust providers in the DC sector, NatWest Cushon has built its proposition on strong technology and ESG credentials. It was also one of the first DC providers to invest part of its default into private markets and productive assets — one of the key drivers behind the government plans to drive consolation in this market. As well as the opportunity to build or add to scale, Cushon’s technology is seen as being a key attraction for a potential buyer.
