SCOR’s Kessler demands Covéa CEO departure from board

SCOR CEO Denis Kessler has sent a letter on Sept. 6 to Covéa chairman and CEO Thierry Derez, asking him to resign from his position as a SCOR board member because of a conflict of interest.

The news was first reported by French newspaper L'Opinion but was confirmed by SCOR.

SCOR said that its “Règlement intérieur” (internal regulations) requires that any board member in a situation of conflict of interest must resign from the board, within one month of being formally notified of the conflict of interest.

In compliance with the group’s governance procedures and “Règlement intérieur”, SCOR asked Thierry Derez, on September 6, to respect his obligations and resign from the board at the earliest opportunity.

Covéa has proposed to acquire a majority stake in SCOR but the proposal was met with unanimous opposition from SCOR's executive committee. Covéa is SCOR’s largest shareholder with an 8.5 percent share of the voting rights.

On Aug. 30, 2018, SCOR's board of directors reviewed the terms and conditions of this unsolicited proposal in detail and determined that it is fundamentally incompatible with SCOR's strategy of independence, which is a key factor of its development, that it would jeopardize the group's strong value-creating strategy and that it reflects neither the intrinsic value nor the strategic value of SCOR.

Covéa is rumoured to be working on a new approach to its planned takeover of the reinsurer.