History
In March 1812, a number of prominent Scotsmen gathered in the Royal Exchange Coffee Rooms in Edinburgh. They were there to discuss setting up ‘a general fund for securing provisions to widows, sisters and other female relatives’ of fundholders so that they would not be plunged into poverty on the death of the fundholder during and after the Napoleonic Wars. Scottish Widows Fund and Life Assurance Society opened in 1815 as Scotland's first mutual life office.
Scottish Widows demutualised and was sold to Lloyds TSB for approximately £7 billion on 3 March 2000. At the time of its takeover, Scottish Widows set up an "additional account" to hold £1.7 billion of the proceeds from the sale. This fund was to be used to enhance terminal bonuses across the company, but was eventually used to compensate guaranteed annuity rate options (GARs) holders.
Read more about this topic: Scottish Widows
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“America is, therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that lie before us, the burden of the World’s history shall reveal itself. It is a land of desire for all those who are weary of the historical lumber-room of Old Europe.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“The history of the Victorian Age will never be written: we know too much about it.”
—Lytton Strachey (1880–1932)
“The history is always the same the product is always different and the history interests more than the product. More, that is, more. Yes. But if the product was not different the history which is the same would not be more interesting.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)