St James’s Place shares fall amid “challenging” year for investors

St James's Place

St James’s Place said that its assets under management surpassed $1 billion in 2019, in its latest results posted on Wednesday.

The wealth management business reported its final results for the year to December-end.

According to the results, funds under management reached £95.6 billion in 2018. However, St James’s Place said that that figure is around £102 billion, following the first few months of 2019.

Meanwhile, net inflows increased to £10.3 billion, compared to £9.5 billion a year ago. In addition, operating profit climbed 9% to £1 billion.

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Andrew Croft, Chief Executive Officer of St James’s Place, commented:

“I am pleased to report a good set of results for 2018, building on an exceptional outcome in 2017 and despite a difficult external environment in the last quarter of the year. This demonstrates once again the resilience of our business.

Mr Croft also announced that the company’s board proposes a final dividend of 29.73p per share, constituting a full year dividend of 48.22p per share, marking growth of 12.5%.

He continued: “It is pleasing to see a recovery in the global stock markets at the start of 2019 which, together with on-going net inflows during January and February have, at the time of writing, taken our funds under management to some £102 billion. The business continues to perform well relative to the industry.”

St James’s Place is publicly listed on the London Stock Exchange. Its headquarters are in Cirencester, Gloucestershire.

Alongside its operations in the UK, St James’s Place also has offices in Asia including Hong Kong, China and Singapore.

Shares in the FTSE-100 company (LON:STJ) are currently -2.93% as of 14:14PM (GMT).

Elsewhere in the markets, M&S shares (LON:MKS) plunged after the retailer announced it was entering a joint delivery service venture with Ocado (LON:OCDO).

Meanwhile, ITV shares (LON:ITV) fell after the broadcaster reported its full-year results. Despite revenues rising, ITV warned on ‘economic and political headwinds’ impacting advertising revenues.