More acquisition than merger April 18, 2017 The sale of Al Ittihad al-Watani Insurance evolved over several years and was rumored in the Lebanese market to involve a number of valuation issues before culminating in an acquisition by NASCO Insurance Group. NASCO, whose founding purpose was brokerage activity and whose main focus is insurance broking, pursued the deal on the grounds that underwriting is becoming more and more heavily regulated and capital intensive. Not all that much was publicly known about the negotiations for the sale of Al Ittihad before NASCO came to the table. According to a document issued in August 2015, Colina Holding, a Mauritius-based subsidiary of Morocco’s Saham Holding – which controlled 81 percent of Lebanon-based LIA Insurance in 2012 – was seeking a $30 million loan from Saham under the rules of the Mauritian stock exchange. The loan’s intended use was for the purchase of the 94 percent stake in Al Ittihad recently taken over by NASCO.