Clive Cowdery, the charismatic insurance entrepreneur, promised to generate private equity-like returns for investors in the public markets yesterday as he announced a £1 billion flotation of Resolution, his turnaround vehicle (see Commentary, right).

Mr Cowdery, who made a £145 million fortune from previously running Resolution as a public company, plans to use it this time to drive mergers and restructuring opportunities in Britain and continental Europe.

He scored a coup in his attempt to shake up the financial services sector with the surprise appointment of John Tiner, former head of the Financial Services Authority, as Resolution’s chief executive. Mr Tiner, who led the City’s most powerful regulator for five years, will be perfectly placed to help Resolution to identify weak targets.

Mr Cowdery has put in place an executive team at Resolution that is packed with loyal lieutenants, including Mike Biggs and Jim Newman, who become chairman and finance director respectively. Phil Hodkinson, a former finance director of HBOS, the bank, also joins as a director. Mr Cowdery will sit on the board with a focus on strategy and acquisitions but with no executive title.

The entrepreneur, who built Resolution into a FTSE 100 company and kept the name when he sold the business to Pearl Assurance for £4.9 billion late last year, has set November as the date for the listing. Mr Cowdery said that he had identified opportunities to invest more than £5 billion in ailing companies across four financial services sectors. Resolution, which is being advised by Lazard, would look for opportunities in life assurance, banking, asset management and general insurance and could increase debt to target far bigger bid prospects.

Mr Cowdery indicated that he had support for his approach from some of the UK’s biggest institutional shareholders, many of whom made stellar returns through their original holdings in Resolution, which he founded in 2003. “Resolution exists to serve the public market in accessing the restructuring gains that have normally fallen solely to private equity,” he said.

Resolution tried to buy Bradford & Bingley, the mortgage bank, this year, but failed after being denied access to the books. It is understood to have also approached Alliance & Leicester before the bank agreed to be taken over by Banco Santander, of Spain.

Prospective investors in Resolution’s float will be offered a placing of £1 billion of “preemption rights”. This will give them a stake in the newly quoted vehicle plus the first right of refusal on subsequent investment opportunities. Resolution will go back to its existing investors as soon as it has identified targets.

Acquisitions would probably be folded into Resolution, with investors being offered stakes in the enlarged company. Once a turnaround is complete, assets will be sold on and the proceeds returned to investors.

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