|
Just Group PLC on Tuesday said it ‘has never been stronger’ as revenue rises by a fifth, despite a widening loss due to rising interest rates. The Surrey, England-based financial services group on focusing on the UK retirement income market reported pretax loss for the calendar year of £317.4 million, widening from a loss of £21.4 million in 2021. The company noted that investment and economic losses widened to £639.2 million, from £251.2 million a year ago, which it said was driven by rising interest rates. Just Group said net premium revenue was £3.12 billion, rising 18% from £2.65 million the year prior. The revenue increase was driven by Defined Benefit De-risking Solutions sales, which were £2.57 billion, up 32% from £1.94 billion a year ago. Just Group said it completed 56 DB transactions, almost double the 29 transactions completed the year before. Meanwhile, Guaranteed Income for Life Solutions sales in the retail market were £564 million, falling 24% from £739 billion. Just Group said it has seen strong momentum in 2023 so far, having made its largest ever DB transaction, worth £513 million, as well as entering the year with a record pipeline of £6 billion. The company declared a final dividend of 1.23 pence per share, up from 1.0p, bringing the total dividend to 1.73p per share. Chief Executive Officer David Richardson said: ‘This is a very strong set of results which continues to demonstrate our ability to generate profitable growth within a sustainable capital model. Over the last four years, our performance has consistently exceeded the commitments we have made. ‘We have had a record start to the year with strong DB volumes and a return to GIfL sales growth. We have significant long term opportunity in both of the DB and retail markets, driven by near and long term structural growth drivers.’ Just Group shares were up 8.7% trading at 89.00 pence per share on Tuesday morning in London. Copyright 2023 Alliance News Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
|
