Total pension scheme buy-in and buyout volumes reached almost £12bn in the first half of 2022, research from Hymans Robertson has revealed.

In its report, Buyouts, but-ins and longevity hedging – H1 2022, Hymans Robertson showed that the total value of deals completed in the first half of the year, up to 30 June 2022, was £11.96bn, a fall on the £20.89bn value of deals completed in the second half of 2021.

The report also detailed the number of deals completed, revealing that 78 buy-ins and buyouts were completed in the first half of 2022, down from 97 deals in the second half of 2021.

Hymans Robertson revealed that the largest market share for the first half of the year in the buy-in and buyout market was held jointly by Legal & General (L&G) and Pension Insurance Corporation (PIC) each with 21 per cent in value, followed by Aviva and Standard Life, each with 20 per cent in value.

During the past year, the value of buy-ins was more than the value of buyouts, with around £7.9bn of buyouts compared to around £24.9bn of buy-ins, although the firm suggested that this trend could be set to reverse in future.

According to Hymans Robertson, the largest transactions in the market over the first half of the year included a £2.3bn buy-in between the British Steel Pension Scheme and L&G, and a £1.1bn buy-in between the Electronic Data Systems 1994 Pension Scheme and PIC.

Elsewhere in the report, Hymans Robertson revealed that the average buy-in and buyout deal size for the previous year was £188m, a decrease from the £210m average from the previous year.

Hymans Robertson head of risk transfer, James Mullins, commented: “Widening credit spreads and insurers competing to meet new business targets led to highly attractive buy-in and buy-out pricing for DB pension schemes who approached the market during 2022.

“Over the last 15 years, around 80 per cent of the market has been pensioner buy-ins and 20 per cent has been buyouts. Going forward, I expect that trend to reverse, with whole-scheme buy-ins and buyouts dominating the market from now on.

“The rapid growth in demand for pension schemes to insure their risks, along with improved pension scheme funding levels, attractive insurer pricing and new alternative risk transfer options, means that we expect over £50bn a year of buy-ins and buyouts on average over the next 10 years.

“That means that, by the end of 2031, £1trn of pension scheme liabilities will have been insured, covering 5 million members’ benefits.”

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