Standard Life said the UK is “an exciting place to do business” as it yesterday reported strong nine-month growth on its new asset manager-style metrics, which record the group’s net inflows, fees and yields, and assets under administration (AUA).
While its bigger insurance rivals Prudential and Aviva cite Asia and the US as their growth engines, amid sluggish growth at home, Standard is touting the UK as offering “significant opportunities in all our core markets”. Standard has also moved away from the traditional “present net value of new business premiums” used across the sector.
Its headline figure is that AUA rose by 13% to £192 billion against the end of 2009, including ‘fee-based business’ up 14% at £158bn. Of the £22.3bn increase, £7.2bn came from net inflows (up 60%) and £15.1bn from a rising market. Third party assets at Standard Life Investments were 21% higher at £69bn, with just over half the increase due to net inflows. Standard strips out its annuities and conventional with-profits business as the ‘spread/risk’ business, which suffered a net outflow of £900,000, up from £500,000 in 2009. However, its fee business saw a 61% rise in net flows from £4.9bn to £7.9bn.
Standard says the average revenue yield across the fee business was 0.71%, down from 0.75%, due largely to SLI, where performance was buoyant in fixed interest and its high-flying global absolute return funds.
Jackie Hunt, chief financial officer, said around 80% of the group’s business was on a fee basis, and investors had driven much of the new reporting.
He said: “They were saying we like the strategy and we like the management team, we think you are well-positioned … but we can’t understand how you generate value.”
David Nish, chief executive, said: “Sipp (self-invested pension) customers in the UK have now passed the 100,000 milestone while our Wrap customer base has grown by 20,000 since the end of last year.”
The Herald revealed last month that Standard is poised to launch a ‘superflex’ benefit offering, where younger employees can opt to use their company pension contribution to help pay off student debt or save for a deposit. The group said yesterday that a new employee wealth and benefits package would be rolled out in the first quarter of 2011.
Source : Herald Scotland
