Hancock Holding Co.’s first insurance agency deal would give the banking company’s long-established insurance operation greater entry into the commercial lines business, a Hancock executive said.
Paul D. Guichet, the vice president of investor relations at Hancock in Gulfport, Miss., said the deal to buy Ross-King-Walker Inc. of Hattiesburg, Miss., would let the bank both enlarge fee income and “expand the cross-selling opportunities from a commercial standpoint with our bank clients and financial services clients, as well as the commercial insurance clients that Ross-King-Walker has.”
The Hattiesburg agency, which has annual revenues of $1.75 million, does about 70% of its business with commercial clients, Mr. Guichet noted. It has 23 employees and offices in Hattiesburg, Pascagoula, Meridian, and Columbia.
The deal, announced Monday, is expected to close during this quarter. Hancock said it would buy Ross-King-Walker in a cash transaction, but the price was not disclosed. The agency is to keep its name, agency team, and organizational structure.
Ross-King-Walker would be a division of Hancock Insurance Agency, which was founded in 1902. Mr. Guichet said Hancock Insurance primarily sells life and annuity products to consumers.
The planned acquisition “allows us to be able to offer a full array of products, both consumer as well as commercial,” Mr. Guichet said. The $4.6 billion-asset banking company would consider other acquisition opportunities as they arise, he said.
Hancock Holding is the parent of Hancock Bank, which operates 103 branches throughout southern Mississippi, as well as in Louisiana and the Florida Panhandle.
Hancock is somewhat unusual among banks that have entered the insurance business because, before this agency deal, its first, it had bought an insurance underwriter.
In January the bank bought Magna Insurance Co. from Union Planters Corp. for an undisclosed price.
Magna sells credit life, accident and health, mortgage life, and other credit insurance products, as well as term life, employer group life, and fixed annuities to Hancock customers and the customers of other banks.
