Boutique insurance brokerage Oxygen Holdings to sell off all assets

LONDON—Oxygen Holdings P.L.C. has announced that it will dispose of all its remaining assets.

The London-based boutique brokerage, which was formed in 2004, on Monday announced the sale of its music and entertainment industry insurance brokerage, Robertson Taylor Holdings Ltd., to Entertainment Insurance Partners for an undisclosed sum.

In August, Oxygen sold its London market brokerage teams to the U.K. operations of Itasca, Ill.-based Arthur J. Gallagher & Co.

Oxygen said Monday that an announcement regarding the sale of its U.K. corporate risks division was “imminent.”

In a statement, Nigel Barton, CEO of Oxygen, said the brokerage had been impacted “by tough trading and some particularly adverse situations in the last few years.”

He said the decision to sell the company was “also influenced by a belief that the short/medium term forecasts for the U.K. and U.S. economies, coupled with continuing weak insurance conditions, would present a very difficult environment for insurance brokers.”

“The stronger insurance broking firms, both big and small, will survive this chapter and will ultimately flourish,” he said. “However, we came to the sad conclusion that Oxygen's financial condition was not strong enough to withstand the chapter ahead.”

He added that while it had originally been planned to sell the company in a single transaction, it became clear that the disposal of individual business units would “better achieve the optimum objective for clients and shareholders.”