Phoenix Group, a UK life assurer, announced a £250m rights issue this morning with an unusual underwriting structure that will mean shareholders are "effectively underwriting the deal" rather than the underwriting banks.

Phoenix Group has arranged the deal in order to pay off some of its group debt and give it the "flexibility" to increase dividends in future, it said in a stock exchange statement this morning. A total of £250m worth of new shares will be issued at a price of 500p, a significant discount to their current market price of 643p, up 8.8% this morning.