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Schroders PLC on Thursday said annual profit and revenue both fell, citing market challenges across 2022, although it did declare an increased dividend for shareholders. The London-based investment manager said 2022 pretax profit was down 23% to £586.9 million from £764.1 million in 2021. Revenue slipped by 2.4% to £2.89 billion from £2.96 billion, while operating expenses increased 4.2% to £1.75 billion from £1.68 billion. Despite this, Schroders marginally raised its payout to shareholders. The company declared a final dividend of 15.0 pence per share, giving a total annual dividend of 21.50p, up 0.5% from 21.40p a year earlier. Shares in Schroders were down 3.3% to 483.90 pence each in London on Thursday morning. ‘The market challenges of 2022 provided a stress test for our strategy. I am encouraged by our resilient performance and that our strategy is working. The businesses we have been building in recent years - across wealth management, private assets and solutions - performed strongly. They are all playing an increasingly important part in our growth and now represent 53% of the group’s assets under management,’ said Chief Executive Officer Peter Harrison. Assets under management on December 31 were valued at £737.5 billion, down 3.8% from £766.7 billion. Harrison continued: ‘Schroders Capital, our private assets business, had a record year with £17.5 billion of fundraising, with particular strength in real estate and private equity. Despite the market dynamics, our wealth management advice businesses had a good year, delivering strong organic growth of 6.6%, while we also continued to build scale in Schroders Solutions.’ Looking ahead, Schroders said it has started 2023 positively and is confident about the company’s trajectory, particularly in Schroders Solutions. This division provides investment and advisory services to pension schemes, official institutions, and insurers, and to individual investors and their intermediaries. Schroders Solutions was expanded at the beginning of 2022 with the acquisition of the similar business of River & Mercantile. Schroders claimed to be an early investor in environmental, social and governance opportunities, which it said has ‘proven to be the right decision and we will continue to invest in 2023 and beyond’, improving its existing capabilities in this area. Copyright 2023 Alliance News Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
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