Aegon platform inflows move past £3bn as Cofunds bounce continues

Edinburgh-based life insurance, pensions and asset management firm Aegon has reported net platform inflows of more than £3 billion for the second quarter of 2017.

Results for the UK arm of the Dutch financial giant now appear to be reflecting the impact of its acquisition of Cofunds.

Overall outflows were up marginally from £5.6 billion to £6.1 billion over the quarter but this was offset by increased inflows, and underlying earnings over the period increased to £31.6 million.

The firm, which employs 2,000 staff at its Edinburgh Park headquarters, said figures for the three months from March show combined assets on the Aegon Retirement Choices and Cofunds platforms rising from £102 billion to 106.6 billion.

Life earnings increased to £17 million because of higher results on inflation-linked bonds.

And pension earnings increased to £13.5 million because of higher equity markets on fee income.

But new life sales declined by 13 per cent in the second quarter, mainly because of the company’s exit from UK annuities - last year Aegon sold two thirds of its UK annuity portfolio to Rothesay Life in order to divert more resources to its adviser platform - and lower sales in US.

The company’s gross deposits almost tripled to £10.8 billion because of UK platform deposits and savings deposits in the Netherlands.

And UK new protection sales ticked up from £7 million to £8 million.

Aegon UK chief executive Adrian Grace took the opportunity of announcing the results to report that plans to integrate Cofunds into the business were “on track and on budget”.

Aegon, which had seen an increase on its own platform’s assets of £7.4 billion to £13.3 billion over 2016, said the acquisition of Cofunds at the beginning of this year added around £80 billion in assets.

Mr Grace added: “The platform growth is due to a combination of exceptional new business flows and buoyant stock markets and the combined platforms experienced net inflows of £3.2 billion. It’s clear that despite macroeconomic uncertainty, advisers are in a bullish mood and are benefiting from a demand for advice which is driving these flows.”

Meanwhile, shares in Aegon jumped in morning trading today, by more than eight per cent, after it announced the sale of its Irish business.

The Dublin-based operation was sold to AGER Bermuda Holding, the owner of Athene, in a deal expected to close by the first quarter of next year.