27th Feb 2014 10:44
LONDON (Alliance News) - Standard Life PLC Thursday reported a 13% decline in pretax operating profit in 2013, as results in 2012 were inflated by a number of gains, but the results still managed to come in ahead of market expectations.
Meanwhile, the Edinburgh-based life insurer revealed that it has put in place provisional plans in case of Scottish voters approve independence, which could involve the move of parts of the company outside Scotland.
The FTSE 100 long-term savings and investments provider said it made an operating pretax profit of GBP751 million in 2013, compared with GBP867 million the year before.
Analysts had been forecasting a 19% decrease to GBP699 million, according to consensus figures published by the company.
Standard Life's 2012 results included GBP333 million from a number of exceptional gains, including a GBP96 million professional indemnity insurance claim, compared to GBP113 million in overall exceptional gains in 2013.
On an underlying basis, which excludes the exceptional items, Standard Life reported growth to GBP638 million from GBP534 million. Standard Life's underlying performance was boosted by a 15% rise in fee based revenue to GBP1.46 billion.
Assets under administration increased by 12% to GBP244.2 billion, just under analyst consensus forecasts of GBP245 billion.
"In the UK we are capitalising on the opportunities created by the retail distribution review and auto enrolment. We attracted 340,000 new customers and increased assets by 13% to GBP150 billion. Standard Life Investments had a particularly good year with third party net inflows of over GBP10 billion as a result of excellent investment performance, broadening geographical reach and an expanding investment offering," David Nish, chief executive, said in a statement.
Standard Life has been one of the investment management companies to benefit from the retail distribution review, a package of measures introduced by regulators that banned the payment of commission fees to independent financial advisers, who now must charge clients transparent fees for their services. On top of that, the pensions provider has benefited from new pension laws that mean companies must gradually automatically enrol their eligible employees into workplace pensions over the coming years.
Standard Life increased its dividend to 15.80 pence from 14.70 pence, ahead of analyst forecasts of 15.66 pence.
Meanwhile, Standard Life, which has been based in Scotland for 189 years, said it is considering its options if the country votes for independence on September 18.
"We have started work to establish additional registered companies to operate outside Scotland, into which we could transfer parts of our operations if it was necessary to do so. This is a precautionary measure to ensure continuity of our businesses' competitive position and to protect the interests of our stakeholders," Nish said in a statement.
Standard Life shares were Thursday quoted at 373.10 pence, down 12.10 pence, or 3.1%.
By Samuel Agini; [email protected]; @samuelagini
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