The firm saw its third party assets under management grow by 25% to £56.9bn last year from £45.5bn in 2008, with third party net inflows accounting for £5.7bn of its total assets under management.

Much of this growth has come from outside the UK, with overseas sales accounting for 80% of its total third party net inflows. Retail net inflows into its UK mutual funds and Sicavs rose significantly from £123m in 2008 to over £1.1bn last year, while its institutional business in the UK and Europe also increased by 26%.

In particular the firm says its fixed income and global absolute return strategies have attracted a lot of interest from both retail and institutional clients and increasingly from outside the UK.
In total SLI reported a profit before tax of £75m for last year, a fall of 19% on 2008. The firm says the reduction was mainly due to the lower interest rates on its cash balances and the servicing of a £30m subordinated loan which was paid in full before the end of the year.

Standard Life Group

Meanwhile, its parent company, Standard Life, reported a 51% increase in net flows to £6.5bn from £4.3bn in 2008 and European Embedded Value operating profit before tax of £919m, a dip from last year’s profit of £933m.

The group also said it had made efficiency savings of £47m during the course of 2009, 62% of the £75m savings it aims to make by the end of 2010. It achieved this through a restructure of its UK distribution and marketing operations, resulting in the loss of 200 employees from the business, outsourcing elements of its IT development and restructuring its Canadian and European customer servicing operations.

In addition, Standard Life has announced plans to make a further £100m efficiency savings by the end of 2012 and to spend £200m on continuing to develop and market its corporate and retail propositions.