A £2.5 billion swap deal between Deutsche Bank and the drugs group AstraZeneca, to cover its pension funds against rising life expectancy, means banks and insurers have signed over £25 billion of these deals since the first transaction in 2009.

Deutsche Bank has closed two large longevity swap transactions in the past week. On Wednesday, the construction group Carillion announced a deal covering £1 billion of pension liabilities, across five different UK schemes, with the investment bank.