More on St James Place
St James’s Place: Q1 2006 new business
Wealth management and insurance group, St James’s Place announced excellent new business figures for the first quarter of 2006. On an APE basis, new business was up 57%, lead by a 71% growth in investment products. Pension sales were up 55%.
Like much of the long term insurance industry, St James’s Place has seen a boom in investment and pensions sales. Unlike most of the industry which also faced a contraction in protection sales the company was able to maintain protection sales at £5.6m.
Helped by the booming market, funds under management rose 10% to £13.5bn compared to end December. Compared to the same period last year, fund under management were up 36%. Gross fees on wealth management were up 37% to £6.5m.
The company warned that relative rates of growth would slow towards the end of the year as much stronger new business comparatives come through but went on add they now anticipate new business volumes to come in at the “upper end of the range of our longer term new business growth target of 15-20% in 2006.”
The company is characterised by prudence and stability in its earnings and hence tend to trade at a premium to the sector.
The share trades at 365p, on a prospective PE (2007 earnings) 14.3x, at the higher end of the sector range, with a poor yield of 1%.
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